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THE   FOUNDATIONS 
AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 


COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 
SALES  AGENTS 

New  York 

LEMCKE  &   BUECHNER 

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Shanghai 

EDWARD  EVANS  &  SONS,  Ltd. 

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THE  FOUNDATIONS 
AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 


BY 


GARY  F.   JACOB,    M.S.,   Ph.D. 


COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 
1918 

All  rights  reserved 


Copyright,  1918 
By  Columbia  Universitt  Press 


Printed  from  type,  February,  1918 


FOREWORD 

Out  of  the  seeming  chaos  of  conflicting  opinion  that  has 
enveloped  the  study  of  Enghsh  prosody,  order  at  last  be- 
gins to  evolve  itself.  The  deplorable  lack  of  agreement 
among  prosodists  as  to  the  very  fundamentals  of  their 
science  has  led  the  sceptically  inclined  to  a  not  unjustifiable 
questioning  with  regard  to  the  propriety  of  dignifying  as 
science  the  mass  of  writing  concerned  with  phenomena 
about  the  nature  of  which  so  great  an  amount  of  uncer- 
tainty has  prevailed  and  still  prevails.  That,  through  a 
long  period  of  years  and  with  ever  increasing  earnestness 
and  skill,  a  large  number  of  scholars  have  kept  untiringly 
at  work  upon  the  solution  of  prosodic  problems,  is  of  itself 
occasion  for  encouragement  and  for  congratulation,  not  for 
discouragement.  The  most  remarkable  aspect  of  the  situa- 
tion, when  one  considers  the  rather  crude  methods  of  in- 
vestigation that  have  until  comparatively  recently  been 
the  only  ones  possible,  is  that  from  so  marked  a  disparity 
of  opinion  as  has  prevailed  an  astonishingly  large  amount 
of  truth  has  been  brought  to  light.  Almost  every  one  who 
has  approached  the  subject  in  a  spirit  of  conscientiousness, 
and  not  of  mere  slavish  imitation,  has  been  able  to  contrib- 
ute something  of  value  to  the  gradually  increasing  quota 
of  knowledge,  even  though  in  many  instances  his  contri- 
bution has  seemed  to  be  at  variance  with  the  precepts  of 
all  established  schools. 

The  chief  difficulty  has  lain  in  the  unusual  breadth  of 
the  field.     Too  frequently  each  writer  has  fixed  his  atten- 


vi  FOREWORD 

tion  exclusively  upon  those  particular  acres  which  could 
be  seen  from  his  own  Httle  rise.  Where  the  range  of  vision 
has  been  sufficiently  broad  to  include  the  areas  covered  by 
other  inquirers,  they  have  formed  themselves  into  a  school 
and  have  taken  up  the  cudgel  against  all  who  did  not  see 
as  they  saw.  This  type  of  partizanship  has  led  to  great 
activity;  but  it  has  not  always  made  for  open-mindedness. 
Often  it  has  been  the  means  of  obscuring  more  truth  than 
it  has  revealed.  The  time  has  now  come  when  quite  a 
number  of  prosodists  are  prepared  to  see  that  the  light 
does  not  rest  exclusively  within  the  keeping  of  any  individ- 
ual or  of  any  one  group.  Facts  can  be  brought  together, 
sometimes  from  the  most  unpromising  sources,  and  their 
correlation  so  established  as  to  effect  a  synthesis  that  does 
not  involve  a  compromise.  This  can  be  accomplished 
more  readily  by  a  qualitative  than  by  a  quantitative 
method  of  procedure,  —  not  so  much  by  a  tabulation  of 
data  as  by  a  judicious  weighing  of  the  facts  already  at  hand. 
"The  use  of  prosody,"  says  Professor  J.  B.  Mayor,^  "is 
to  supply  a  technical  language  by  which  to  describe  each 
specimen  of  verse  brought  before  us,  to  distinguish  the 
different  kinds  of  verse,  and  to  establish  a  type  of  each, 
with  reference  to  which  existing  varieties  may  be  compared, 
and  finally  to  state  the  laws  of  composition  which  have 
been  observed  by  those  whom  the  world  recognizes  as 
poets.  Then  from  this  we  may  draw  practical  rules  of 
art  for  the  use  of  the  poet  or  the  reader."  Fortunately, 
the  poets  before  beginning  to  write  have  never  waited  for 
the  prosodists  to  formulate  the  rules  of  poetic  art.  Guided 
by  the  verse  of  their  predecessors  and  by  their  own  good 
taste,  they  have  written.  It  has  remained  for  the  proso- 
dist  to  reformulate  his  rules  time  and  time  again  in  order 
that  they  might  meet  the  demands  of  an  ever  broadening 
^  Transactions  of  the  Philological  Society,  1873-4,  p.  624. 


FOREWORD  Vll 

conception  of  art.  Where  the  rules  have  not  been  suflB- 
ciently  elastic,  the  rules,  and  not  the  verse,  have  had  to  go 
by  the  boa!rd.  The  function  of  the  prosodist  is  to  describe 
and  to  interpret,  —  not  to  make  rules,  but  to  say  what 
rules  the  poets  seem  to  have  followed.  As  critic  he  can 
praise  or  condemn,  —  not,  however,  on  the  ground  of  prece- 
dent, but  upon  the  more  comprehensive  basis  of  whether 
or  not  a  given  production  follows  the  natural  and  artistic 
trend  of  its  genus. 

"In  a  subject  like  prosody,"  Professor  Mayor  continues, 
"there  is  danger  of  confused  treatment,  arising  from  its 
connection  with  history  on  the  one  hand  and  aesthetics  on 
the  other.  There  are  thus  three  views  which  may  be  taken 
of  it:  [first,]  .  .  .  the  purely  scientific,  or  logical;  secondly, 
the  historical,  which  brings  in  the  succession  of  time,  and 
traces  the  growth  of  one  form  out  of  another;  thirdly,  the 
aesthetic,  or  subjective,  which  adds  criticism  to  statement 
of  fact,  and  points  out  beauties  and  defects  in  the  various 
metres,  or  in  the  manner  in  which  they  have  been  handled. 
It  is  of  great  importance  that  the  first  view  should  be  kept 
clear  of  the  other  two,  that  an  antiquarian  yoke,  for  in- 
stance, should  not  be  laid  upon  the  readers  and  the  writers 
of  the  present,  and  their  verses  be  denied  to  be  metrical 
at  all,  or  else  twisted  and  mangled  to  suit  the  usage  of  five 
centuries  ago;  just  as  the  modern  sentence  might  be  con- 
demned as  ungrammatical  because  it  could  not  be  explained 
on  antiquarian  views  of  syntax." 

In  my  attempt  to  avoid  most  effectively  the  pitfalls  into 
which  so  many  prosodists  have  stumbled,  I  must  say  at 
once,  that,  although  I  consider  both  the  historical  and 
the  aesthetic  methods  of  the  highest  importance  and  of 
indispensable  value  in  establishing  a  comprehensive  view 
of  the  subject,  and  that,  although  I  shall  use  them  wher- 
ever they  can  make  plainer  the  path  I  have  chosen,  never- 


Viu  FOREWORD 

theless,  it  is  the  purely  scientific,  or  logical,  method  I 
purpose  to  follow,  (1)  because  it  offers  the  most  satisfactory- 
solution  of  a  large  number  of  existing  problems;  (2)  be- 
cause, in  consequence  of  recent  investigations  by  psychol- 
ogists and  physicists,  much  invaluable  material  is  for  the 
first  time  available,  which  must  be  interpreted  upon  some 
broad,  general  principle  before  it  can  influence  our  con- 
ception of  the  poetic  principle;  (3)  because,  through  the 
application  of  the  results  of  these  experiments  to  prosodic 
problems,  quite  a  number  of  questions  which  until  now  have 
been  in  abeyance  can  at  last  be  answered  definitely  and, 
I  hope,  finally;  (4)  because,  unless  certain  facts  are  placed 
before  them  at  this  time,  the  workers  in  the  fields  of  his- 
torical and  aesthetic  prosody  may  find  themselves  in  need 
of  knowledge,  a  lack  of  which  may  occasion  them  con- 
siderable delay  in  solving  their  own  particular  problems. 

I  do  not  pretend  to  present  any  fact  hitherto  unknown. 
Whatever  value  this  contribution  may  have,  rests,  I  be- 
lieve, in  the  bringing  together  of  a  large  body  of  material 
until  now  undigested.  Many  of  the  propositions  herein 
set  forth  are  the  result  of  independent  conclusions  reached 
at  a  time  when  there  was  only  my  own  judgment  to  sup- 
port them.  Since  experimental  psychology  has  now  given 
validity  to  these  opinions,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  present  them 
as  facts  and  to  add  in  their  support  the  weight  of  such  other 
authority  as  I  have  been  able  to  collect. 

I  regret  that  it  is  impossible  for  me  to  publish  at  this 
time  a  complete  bibliography  of  the  enormous  number  of 
books,  pamphlets,  and  magazine  articles  relating  to  the 
prosodic  problem.  Such  a  bibliography  would  be  a  volume 
in  itself.  I  am  glad,  however,  to  be  able  to  append  to  this 
dissertation  a  few  works  containing  full,  though  not  com- 
plete, references  to  the  important  contributions  to  the  sub- 
ject.    If  the  drudgery  of  others  whose  interest  shall  tempt 


FOREWORD  ix 

them  to  rework  the  ground  I  have  covered  can  thus  be 
lightened  in  any  wise  so  as  to  give  them  more  time  for 
constructive  thought  upon  vital  issues,  I  feel  that  they, 
too,  will  recognize  the  debt  of  gratitude  due  the  compilers 
of  these  bibliographies. 

GARY  F,  JACOB 
University  of  Virginia., 
June  1,  1917 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

Foreword v 

I.    Introduction 1 

II.   Noise  and  Tone 8 

III.  Pitch 12 

IV.  Tone  Quality 38 

V.   The  Quality  of  Vowel  Sounds 43 

VI.   Intensity 61 

VII.    Genetic  Aspects  of  Rhythm 65 

VIII.   Time      80 

IX.   Rhythm  Defined 95 

X.   Duration 103 

XL   Accent 122 

XII.   The  Phrase:    its  Nature  and  its  Length 144 

XIII.  Rhyme  and  the  Line  :  their  Relation  to  the  Phrase  .  160 

XIV.  The  Structure  of  the  Foot:  Accent,  Duration,  and 

Pitch  in  the  General  Process  of  Time  Synthesis    .  168 

XV.   The  Content  of  the  Phrase 193 

XVI.   The  Rhythm  of  Prose 199 

XVII.   Scansion 211 

XVIII.   Summary 213 

Appendix  (Bibliography) 219 

Index 221 


THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND 
NATURE    OF    VERSE 


CHAPTER  I 
INTRODUCTION 

So  thoroughly  accustomed  to  the  use  of  print  are  we  that 
years  of  our  Hves  are  spent  in  silent  enjoyment  of  its  mes- 
sage without  our  once  being  impressed  by  the  complexity 
of  the  act  we  are  performing.^  We  lose  sight  entirely  of 
the  difficulty  with  which  we  first  learned  to  associate  sound 
with  symbol  and  symbol  with  sound.  And  what  of  our 
first  attempts  to  read  without  pronouncing  the  words 
aloud?  What  of  the  days  and  days  spent  in  preliminary 
whispering  before  we  finally  succeeded  in  suppressing  every 
muscular  movement  except  those  of  the  lips?  But  in  time 
these,  too,  were  overcome;  and  the  silent  association  of 
sound  and  symbol  passed  from  the  field  of  the  automatic 
to  that  of  the  reflex,  so  that  through  the  medium  of  the 
eye  the  mind  was  finally  capable  not  only  of  hearing  and 
interpreting  the  unspoken  sounds  but  also  of  shading  them 
with  every  degree  of  intensity,  duration,  and  pitch.  After 
this  stage  has  been  reached,  it  does  not  require  an  unusual 
endowment  of  imagination  to  carry  us  a  step  or  two  far- 
ther until  even  the  facial  expressions  and  the  gestures  ac- 
companying the  words  of  the  speakers  present  themselves 

^  Walter  Fenno  Dearborn:  "The  Psychology  of  Reading,"  Archives 
of  Psychology,  Science  Press. 

1 


2    THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

to  us;  and  we  are  able  to  grasp  simultaneously  both  the 
complexities  of  an  exciting  situation  and  the  nicest  subtle- 
ties of  character  and  of  motive,  —  all  without  our  raising 
our  eyes  from  the  page  or  uttering  one  sound.  Add  to 
this,  particularly  in  the  case  of  verse,  the  conscious  enjoy- 
ment of  the  beauties  of  rhj^thm  and  of  vowel  and  conso- 
nant combinations  and  correspondences,  which,  aside  from 
the  ideas  which  they  convey,  give  to  the  words  themselves 
a  peculiar  fascination;  and  the  occasion  for  wonder  is  any- 
thing but  decreased. 

Even  in  the  face  of  such  an  accomplishment  as  this, 
however,  we  are  no  little  surprised  and  just  a  bit  incredu- 
lous on  being  told,  that,  without  the  aid  of  an  instrument 
or  even  of  his  voice,  a  well-trained  musician  can  enjoy  the 
harmonies  symbolized  by  the  lines  and  dots  of  an  orches- 
tral score.  Such  a  feat  seems  almost  impossible.  Still,  as 
between  the  reading  of  print  and  the  reading  of  music, 
the  latter  is  the  less  remarkable  accomplishment.  Cer- 
tainly it  involves  for  the  musically  endowed  much  less  tax 
upon  either  the  imagination  or  the  powers  of  interpreta- 
tion than  the  reading  of  print  involves  for  the  ordinary 
man.  The  comparative  infrequence  of  our  meeting  with 
any  one  able  to  interpret  a  musical  score  as  readily  as  he 
can  interpret  the  written  page  is  due  to  the  fact  that  only 
a  very  few  persons  ever  have  occasion  to  become  as  en- 
tirely familiar  with  the  sounds  of  the  different  musical 
instruments,  or  even  with  those  of  any  one  instrument, 
as  practically  every  one  has  of  becoming  with  the  speech 
sounds  themselves,  if  not  with  the  speech  symbols.  The 
processes  involved  in  the  interpretation  of  the  one  set  of 
symbols  are  exactly  those  involved  in  the  interpretation 
of  the  other;  and,  if  the  two  were  equally  familiar,  the 
musically  inclined  might  stretch  himself  in  his  easy  chair 
for  the  enjojnnent  of  an  evening  of  Beethoven  quite  as  fre- 


INTRODUCTION  3 

quently  as  the  man  of  literary  tastes  now  spends  his  time 
with  Shelley  or  with  Wordsworth. 

Although  prose  or  verse  or  music  may  be  read  and  en- 
joyed without  the  intermediary  voice  as  interpreter,  I  do 
not  suppose  any  one  doubts,  that,  because  the  mind  is  able 
to  supply  through  the  imagination  its  own  instrument  of 
sound  production,  prose  or  verse  or  music  is  not  essentially 
and  completely  an  appeal  to  the  intelligence  and  the  emo- 
tions through  the  muscular  sense  or  through  the  sense  of 
hearing.^  It  is  quite  possible  to  exchange  ideas  by  other 
means  than  the  medium  of  sound.  Witness  the  sign  lan- 
guage of  the  dumb.  Under  certain  conditions,  a  fire  on  a 
mountain  top,  a  grouping  of  different  colored  flags,  or  even 
postures  of  the  body  can  convey  their  message  quite  as 
effectively  as  if  words  were  employed.  It  is  only  when 
the  ideas  to  be  expressed  have  become  highly  complex  in 
character  that  so  delicate  and  varied  a  system  of  communi- 
cation as  is  language  need  be  employed,  or  that  sounds, 
which  in  the  early  periods  of  our  history  as  a  race  were  of 
the  most  rudimentary  nature,  may  develop  into  the  medium 
of  expression  for  our  most  exalted  emotions.  Serving  at 
the  one  extreme  the  purposes  of  our  common,  daily  needs, 
as  the  ideas  to  be  expressed  become  more  and  more  emo- 
tionalized, words  may  be  combined  to  meet  the  respective 
exigencies    of    prose,'-    oratory,    street    cries,^    verse,    song- 

^  Wilhelm  August  Ambrose:  "The  Boundaries  of  Music  and  Poetry  " 
(G.  Schirmer,  New  York,  1903),  pp.  127-138. 

Harry  Porter  Weld:  "An  Experimental  Study  of  Musical  Enjoy- 
ment," Amer.  Journal  of  Psychol,  1912,  XXIII.,  pp.  245-308. 

Christian  A.  Ruchmick:  "The  Role  of  Kinaesthetics  in  the  Per- 
ception of  Rhythm,"  Amer.  Journal  of  Psychol,  1913,  XXIV. 

2  F.  von  Andrian:  "Some  Results  of  Modern  Ethnology,"  Cor- 
respondenzblatt  der  deutschen  Gesellschaft  fur  Anthropologic,  Ethno- 
logic, und  Urgeschichte,  1894,  No.  8,  p.  71.  I  do  not  agree  with  this 
writer  in  thinking  that  the  development  of  prose  followed  that  of  verse. 

3  WiUiam  Gardner:   "The  Music  of  Nature." 


4    THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

speech/  intoning,^  recitative,^  chanting/  and  vocal  music,^ 
until,  finally,  at  the  other  extreme,  having  become  void  of 
all  significance  as  language,  syllables  may  find  use  in  giv- 
ing tone  quality  to  the  voice  in  its  more  or  less  ambitious 
flights  into  the  realm  of  pure  music.  The  same  sounds  which 
at  breakfast  enable  us  to  order  eggs  and  toast  may  in  other 
combinations  when  falling  from  the  Hps  of  Maud  Adams 
move  us  to  laughter  or  to  tears,  or  may  transport  us  into 
the  land  of  the  invisible  when  used  by  Alma  Gluck  in  the 
soarings  of  a  florid  Italian  aria  or  in  her  adaptation  to  the 
voice  of  such  a  purely  instrumental  composition  as  Raff's 
"Elegie."  All  who  are  familiar  with  the  sermonizing  of 
the  negro  exhorter  must  have  noticed  how,  with  the  rise 
of  emotional  intensity,  he  passes  from  singsong  to  shout- 
ing, and  finally,  without  interruption,  to  the  rocking  melody 
of  a  spiritual  in  the  burden  of  which  intellectual  signifi- 
cance may  be  entirely  lacking.^  A  similar  use  of  mean- 
ingless syllables  is  common  in  the  burdens  of  folk-songs 
and  popular  ballads  of  nearly  all  peoples.''     It  should  be 

1  Billert:  " Japanische  Musik"  in  Reissm.  Mend.  Lexicon,  5th  vol., 
p.  368. 

*  Jacobsthal:  "  Musikalische  Bildung  der  Meistersanger"  in  Haupt's 
Zeitschrift  fiir  deutsches  AUerthum,  XX,  80  ff. 

^Richard  Wallaschek:  "Primitive  Music"  (Longmans,  London, 
1893),  pp.  180-186. 

*  Theodor  Baker:  "tJber  die  Musik  der  Nordamerikanischen  Wil- 
den,"  p.  47. 

6F.  B.  Gummere:  "The  Beginnings  of  Poetry"  (Macmillan,  1901), 
Chapters  II,  through  V. 

6  H.  E.  Krehbeil:  "Afro-American  Folk  Song"  (G.  Schirmer,  N.  Y.) 
Guessfelt,  Falkenstein,  Pechuel-Loesche:  "Die  Loango  Expedition," 
p.  76.  I  am  familiar  with  the  life  of  the  negroes  of  Virginia,  of  which 
state  I  am  a  native,  and  in  three  sections  of  which  I  have  lived  consecu- 
tively for  many  years. 

^  Richard  Wallaschek:  "Primitive  Music,"  pp.  170-172.  Numerous 
examples  can  be  found  in  F.  J.  Child's  "English  and  Scottish  Popular 
Ballads."  For  a  satisfactory  example  see  page  344  of  the  Houghton 
Miiflin  Company's  edition  of  1904. 


INTRODUCTION  5 

clear,  therefore,  that  the  capacity  for  this  infinity  of  ex- 
pression rests  in  the  human  voice  just  as  certainly  as  an 
equal  capacity  for  the  perception  of  these  sounds  rests  in 
the  ear,  and  that  both  music  and  poetry  have  at  their 
disposal  the  medium  of  sound  for  suggesting  or  inducing 
emotions, — that  is,  for  "sympathetic  induction  of  emo- 
tion," as  William  McDougall  very  aptly  phrases  it.^  Thus 
poetry  and  vocal  music,  because  they  make  use  of  words, 
can  attain  effects  far  more  definite  than  those  possible  to 
pure  music.2  By  means  of  words,  for  instance,  the  progress 
of  a  fight  can  be  followed  in  detail.  Without  words,  a 
warlike  emotion  would  be  the  nearest  approach  to  the 
concrete  which  the  same  music  could  arouse.  Yet,  with 
words  or  without  them,  the  pleasure  derived  from  art  is 
subjective.  Though  excited  by  the  work  of  art,  it  is  in 
oneself  and  of  oneself.^  The  appeal  is  to  the  primal  na- 
ture of  man.  The  sublimation  may  be  so  complete  that 
the  origin  of  the  emotion  may  be  lost  sight  of;  but  a  careful 
investigation  will  invariably  show  that  the  primitive  in- 
stinct of  struggle  against  environment  and  the  pervading 
urge  of  sex  furnish  the  psychological  basis  for  the  mate- 
rial with  which  the  tonal  arts  must  deal.  Love,  hate, 
triumph,  despair,  joy,  sorrow,  awe,  fear,  —  one  and  all 
from  the  shadow-land  of  psychic  awakening,  —  are  the 
emotions  which  arise  most  vividly  at  the  seductive  lure  of 
sound. 

It  is  not  my  purpose,  however,  to  treat  of  the  physiolog- 
ical effect  of  sound  upon  the  ear  or  of  its  aesthetic  value 
when  heard.  I  can  mention  them  only  in  passing;  yet 
mention   them   I    must.     Otherwise   it   might   be   thought 

1  "Social  Psychology"  (John  Luce  and  Co.,  Boston,  1911),  p.  92. 
''Harry  Porter  Weld:    "An  Experimental  Study  of  Musical  En- 
joyment," Amer.  Journal  of  PstjchoL,  XXIII.,  April,  1912,  pp.  245-308. 
'  J.  Donovan:   "From  Lyre  to  Muse,"  p.  87. 


6    THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

that  I  am  attempting  to  account  upon  a  strictly  physical 
basis  for  all  the  phenomena  of  the  tonal  arts.  When  the 
last  word  as  to  the  physical  structure  and  form  has  been 
said,  the  hitherto  incalculable  factor  of  the  psychological 
capacity  for  the  appreciation  of  art  must  be  taken  into 
consideration.  Yet,  for  the  purposes  of  this  inquiry,  it 
must  be  granted  that  the  ear  does  hear  and  that  it  does 
find  pleasure  in  such  sounds  as  through  the  ages  have 
furnished  the  material  for  art.^  Fortunately,  the  funda- 
mental phenomena  of  the  subject  lie  within  the  range  of 
experience  common  to  civilized  and  even  to  savage  man, 
so  that  the  physiological  psychologist  has  been  able  to  work 
out  in  his  laboratory  answers  to  the  most  important  ques- 
tions which  suggest  themselves.  Not  until  these  have 
been  exhausted  need  there  be  any  dispute  relative  to  mat- 
ters of  taste;  but,  whenever  taste  is  involved,  whatever 
the  ears  of  men  of  artistic  temperament  do  not  condemn 
in  the  purely  physical  structure  of  a  composition  must  be 
pronounced  at  least  passable  art.  All  that  can  not  be  es- 
tablished through  the  ear  must  remain  unsolved.  There- 
fore, for  the  time  being,  as  my  interest  is  neither  antiquarian 
nor  aesthetic,  I  must  address  myself  primarily  to  those 
who  are  interested  in  the  physical  structure  of  verse. 

Certain  phenomena  are  common  to  prose,  verse,  and 
music.  Wherein  and  to  what  extent  the  three  are  dis- 
similar can  be  shown  to  be  the  result  of  slightly  different 
uses  made  of  the  same  physical  material,  so  that  the  separate 
forms  are  exhibited  as  arising  from  the  same  phenomena 
through  the  combination  in  varying  degrees  of  their  several 
constituent  parts.  Prose  will  be  seen  to  grade  almost 
imperceptibly  into  verse,   verse  into  song,  and  song  into 

1  Henry  T.  Moore:  "The  Genetic  Aspects  of  Consonance  and  Dis- 
sonance," Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  XVII.,  No.  73  (Psychological 
Review  Co.,  Lancaster,  Pa.). 


INTRODUCTION  7 

pure  music.  Indeed,  there  is  often  much  discussion  as  to 
with  which  of  two  art  forms  a  certain  production  should 
rightly  be  classed.  For  my  part,  however,  I  can  see  no 
reason  why  any  one  need  puzzle  himself  with  the  drawing 
of  over-nice  distinctions.  The  boundaries  of  the  three 
forms  are  much  too  ill-defined  to  admit  of  one's  making  a 
clean-cut  partition.  Yet,  lest  my  attitude  on  this  point 
be  misunderstood,  I  hasten  to  say  that  I  do  not  think  the 
highest  art  ever  results  from  a  form  which  is  not  clearly 
and  definitely  on  one  side  of  the  marches. 


CHAPTER  II 
NOISE  AND  TONE 

All  sound  is  the  result  of  vibration.  First,  there  is  the 
vibration  of  the  body  in  which  the  sound  originates;  second, 
the  vibration  of  some  medium  (normally  the  atmosphere) 
which  transmits  the  sound;  and,  third,  the  vibration  of 
the  nerves  of  the  ear  of  the  person  who  perceives  the  sound. 
Sound,  therefore,  may  be  defined  as  "the  sensation  result- 
ing from  the  action  of  an  external  stimulus  on  the  sensitive 
nerve  apparatus  of  the  ear";^  yet  for  present  purposes  it 
is  better  to  restrict  the  meaning  of  the  term  so  as  to  have  it 
designate,  not  the  resulting  sensation,  but  rather  the  vibra- 
tions originating  in  the  sounding  body  itself,  because  to 
these  are  due  all  the  peculiarities  which  are  felt  as  char- 
acteristic of  any  sound  or  combination  of  sounds. 

Art  does  not  make  use  of  all  kinds  of  sounds.  It  selects 
only  those  capable  of  coordination  by  the  ear,  —  that  is, 
only  those  which  are  musical.  It  is  well,  therefore,  in 
analyzing  sounds  to  divide  them  into  two  classes.  Those 
of  the  first  class  are  called  noises;  those  of  the  second, 
tones. 

"Noise  and  tone  are  merely  terms  of  contrast,  in  extreme  cases 
clearly  distinct,  but  in  other  instances  blending;  the  difference 
between  noise  and  tone  is  one  of  degree.  A  simple  tone  is  abso- 
lutely simple  mechanically;  ^  a  musical  tone  is  morte  or  less  complex, 

1  Dayton  Clarence  Miller:  "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  2 
(Macmillan,  1916). 

^  It  is  the  result  of  vibration  back  and  forth  like  that  of  a  pendulum 
when  allowed  to  swing  freely  in  its  arc. 


NOISE   AND  TONE  9 

but  the  relations  of  the  component  tones,  and  of  one  musical  sound 
to  another,  are  appreciated  by  the  ear;  noise  is  a  sound  of  too  short 
duration  or  too  complex  in  structure  to  be  analyzed  or  understood 
by  the  ear. 

"The  distinction  sometimes  made  that  noise  is  due  to  non- 
periodic  vibration  while  tone  is  periodic,^  is  not  sufficient;  analysis 
clearly  shows  that  many  so-called  tones  are  non-periodic  .  .  .  , 
and  it  is  equally  certain  that  noises  are  as  periodic  as  some  tones. 
In  some  instances  noises  are  due  to  changing  period,  producing  the 
effect  of  non-periodicity;  but  by  far  the  greater  number  of  noises 
which  are  continuous  are  merely  complex  and  apparently  irregular, 
their  analysis  being  more  or  less  difficult. 

"The  ear,  through  lack  of  training  or  from  absence  of  suitable 
standards  for  comparison  or  perhaps  on  account  of  fatigue,  often 
fails  to  appreciate  the  character  of  sounds  and,  relaxing  the  atten- 
tion, classifies  them  as  noises."  ^ 

Just  here  let  me  emphasize  a  fact  which  I  shall  have 
occasion  to  reiterate,  sometimes  to  the  extent  of  tedious- 
ness,  yet  which  cannot  be  too  much  dwelt  upon  if  an  ac- 
curate conception  of  the  nature  of  the  phenomena  under 
consideration  is  to  be  obtained.  As  with  noise  and  tone,  so 
with  all  forms  of  art  in  which  sound  is  employed,  —  there  is 
no  clear-cut  line  of  demarkation  between  them.  There  are 
musical  noises  and  unmusical  tones.  Art  may  employ 
both,  provided  the  choice  be  made  with  circumspection. 
Differences  in  sounds  are  matters  of  degree,  not  of  inherent 
differences  of  nature,  so  that,  although  I  have  said  that 
art  selects  only  those  sounds  capable  of  coordination,  I  do 
not  wish  to  make  the  impression  that  sounds,  which  under 
ordinary  circumstances  would  be  considered  as  noises 
(such  as  the  clacking  of  bones  or  the  beating  of  the  tambou- 
rine), may  not  be  capable  of  coordination  in  some  partic- 

^  Periodic  means  recurring  at  regular  intervals  of  time. 
2  Dayton    Clarence    Miller:     "The   Science   of    Musical   Sounds," 
pp.  21-22. 


10         THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

ular,  and,  therefore,  have  their  artistic  uses,  or  that  sounds 
which  are  coordinate,  say  in  pitch  (such  as  the  regular  vi- 
brations of  very,  very  low  organ  pipes),  may  not  affect  the 
ear  so  disagreeably  as  to  be  regarded  as  noises  unfit  for 
artistic  purposes.  In  fact,  it  is  impossible  to  exclude  noise 
completely  from  even  the  purest  musical  sounds.  The 
buzzing  due  to  the  friction  of  the  bow  as  it  is  drawn  across 
the  strings  of  the  violin,  the  glottal  catch  preceding  the 
pronunciation  of  some  vowels,^  and  the  hissing  sound  of  the 
letter  s,  to  mention  only  a  few  instances,  are  cases  in  point, 
presented  at  this  time  merely  by  way  of  illustration.  We 
may  begin,  therefore,  by  excluding  all  sounds  popularly 
considered  as  noises,  and  from  now  on  confine  our  atten- 
tion strictly  to  tones. 

Any  sound  possessing  continuity  and  definiteness  to  such 
a  degree  as  may  be  appreciated  by  the  ear  is  called  a  tone. 
All  tones  are  characterized  in  four  ways,  —  according  (1)  to 
pitch  or  frequency,  (2)  to  quality  or  tone  color,  (3)  to  loudness 
or  intensity,  and  (4)  to  duration  or  length.  Upon  pitch, 
quality,  intensity,  and  duration  depends  every  distinguish- 
ing feature  of  tonal  art  which  has  a  physical  basis.  Their 
combination  into   various  tonal  and   temporal   units  is  a 

'  Fred  Newton  Scott:  "Vowel  Alliteration  in  Modern  Poetry,"  in 
Modern  Language  Notes,  Dec,  1915,  Vol.  XXX.,  pp.  233-237.  The 
note  at  the  bottom  of  page  237  is  of  importance: 

"L.  P.  H.  Eijkman's  'Notes  on  English  Prosody'  in  Die  Neuen 
Sprachen,  xvii,  443,  and  Daniel  Jones's  comment,  Ibid.,  p.  571.  Eijk- 
man  and  Jones  agree  that  the  glottal  catch  is  not  uncommon  in  normal 
English  speech,  and  the  former  quotes  the  letter  wi'itten  by  Lloyd 
Vietor  in  1894  (Victor,  Elemente  d.  Phonetik,  paragraph  30,  Ann.  5): 
'I  have  not  noticed  any  special  substitution  of  glottal  catch,  for  a  dropped 
h;  but  I  do  notice  that  clear  beginning,  sometimes  forcible  enough  to 
be  called  glottal  catch,  exists  largely  in  English  in  certain  positions,  e.g. 

(a)  when  another  vowel,  especially  a  very  similar  vowel,  precedes; 

(b)  when  a  strong  emphasis  is  intended.  A  speaker  laboring  under 
suppressed  passion  uses  unconsciously  the  clear  beginning.'" 


NOISE   AND   TONE  11 

psychological  process.  The  use  made  by  the  mind  of  the 
phenomena  thus  presented  to  it  is  the  result  of  subjective 
elements  that  need  not  be  considered  until  after  each  of 
these  purely  physical  components  has  first  been  dealt  with 
in  turn. 

When  pitch  has  been  explained,  I  shall  attempt  to  show 
to  what  artistic  purposes  it  may  be  put  and  why  the  mind 
accepts  some  pitches  and  refuses  others.  Then,  quality 
and  intensity  must  undergo  like  manner  of  treatment. 
Finally,  the  all-important  question  of  time  and  of  temporal 
relationships  will  have  to  be  disposed  of.  For,  not  until 
these  four  elements  are  understood  as  they  are  employed 
in  their  general  aspects  by  prose,  verse,  and  music,  will 
it  be  possible  to  focus  the  discussion  upon  the  specific  prob- 
lems of  verse. 


CHAPTER  III 
PITCH 

"The  pitch  of  a  sound  is  that  tone  characteristic  of  be- 
ing acute  or  grave  which  determines  its  position  in  the  musi- 
cal scale;  an  acute  sound  is  of  high  pitch,  a  grave  sound 
of  low  pitch.  Experiment  proves  that  pitch  depends  upon 
a  very  simple  condition,  the  number  of  complete  vibra- 
tions per  second;  this  number  is  called  the  frequency  of  the 
vibration."  ^ 

The  sound  produced  by  a  tuning  fork  is  the  result  of 
simple,  pendular  vibrations  set  up  in  two  metal  bars.  In 
string  instruments,  —  such  as  the  violins,  the  guitar,  the 
piano,  etc.,  —  the  sound  is  due  to  the  vibration  of  the 
strings.  Under  the  general  title  wind-instruments  may 
be  classed  flutes,  oboes,  clarinets,  horns  of  all  kinds,  the 
pipe-organ,  the  human  voice,  etc.  In  all  instruments  of 
this  latter  type  the  sound  is  the  result  of  vibration  induced 
in  a  stream  of  air,  either  by  directing  it  against  a  sharp 
edge  (as  in  the  flute  and  the  flute-pipes  of  the  organ),  or 
by  causing  it  to  set  in  motion  an  elastic  tongue  or  reed  (as 
in  some  of  the  pipes  of  the  organ,  in  the  oboe,  and  in  the 
clarinet).  In  all  wind-instruments  it  is  necessary  that  the 
air  be  confined  in  a  resonance  chamber  of  some  descrip- 
tion, such  as  that  furnished  by  the  tube  of  the  clarinet. 
Otherwise  the  tones  are  lacking  in  strength  or  in  agree- 
ableness  or  in  both.  For  the  production  of  voice  sounds, 
two  elastic,  membranous  bands,  called  the  vocal  cords,  at- 
tached to  the  walls  of  the  larynx,  are  drawn  across  the 
1  D.  C.  Miller:  "Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  26. 
12 


PITCH  13 

trachea  until  their  free  edges  meet.  Between  these  edges 
air  from  the  lungs  passes,  causing  the  cords  to  vibrate. 
The  vocal  cords  have  the  power  of  thickening,  flattening, 
shortening,  or  of  vibrating  in  whole  or  in  part,  according 
as  the  sound  to  be  produced  is  high  or  low.  The  rate  of 
their  vibration,  of  course,  determines  the  pitch  emitted. 
The  buccal  and  nasal  cavities  furnish  the  necessary  reso- 
nance chamber.^ 

Some  instruments,  notably  the  piano  and  the  pipe-organ, 
can  produce  only  those  pitches  to  which  they  are  tuned. 
Others,  like  the  violin  and  the  human  voice,  have  at  their 
disposal  an  infinite  variety  of  pitches,  limited,  of  course, 
by  the  number  of  vibrations  possible  within  the  range  of 
any  particular  kind  of  instrument.  Though  an  exceedingly 
sensitive  ear  is  capable  of  perceiving  as  continuous  sounds 
with  frequencies  as  low  as  six  or  eight  and  as  high  as  twenty 
thousand  or  even  thirty  thousand,  the  sounds  available 
for  artistic  purposes  range  in  frequency  from  about  six- 
teen to  4,138.^  The  compass  of  the  singing  voice  is  from 
sixty  for  a  low  bass  to  about  thirteen  hundred  for  a  very 
high  soprano.     The  speaking  voice  is  still  further  restricted. 

"It  is  evident  that  the  passage  from  one  pitch  to  another  must 
be  made  in  one  of  two  ways.  Either  the  pitch  of  a  sound  changes 
suddenly  from  the  initial  state  to  the  final  state,  in  such  a  way 
that  at  no  moment  does  the  sound  rest  at,  or  pass  through,  any 
intermediate  degree  of  pitch;  or  the  pitch  changes  gradually  in 
the  direction  of  the  final  degree  of  pitch,  that  is,  either  upward  or 
downward,  and  so  passes  through  every  possible  intermediate  de- 
gree but  rests  at  none  {portamento  tones).    These  are  the  only  two 

1  A  very  clear,  popular  description  of  the  organs  of  speech  is  to  be 
found  in  the  "Encyclopedia  Britannica"  under  Voice. 

^  Physicists  vary  in  their  findings  with  regard  to  range  of  musical 
audibiUty.  I  am  quoting  from  the  experiments  of  Dr.  Rudolph  Koenig, 
which  were  conducted  with  unusual  care. 


14        THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

ways  in  which  a  sound  emanating  from  one  and  the  same  instru- 
ment can  pass  from  one  pitch  to  another.  They  may  be  compared 
to  stepping  and  ghding.  In  the  one  case  the  intermediate  space  is 
leaped  over,  in  the  other  it  is  traversed. "  ^ 

In  ancient  Greek  music  the  unit  of  division  was  originally 
the  tetrachord;  in  medieval  music  it  was  the  hexachord. 
In  modern  music  it  is  the  octave.  Within  these  limits  the 
tone  successions  are  arranged  in  various  scales.  The  suc- 
cessive tones  of  a  scale  are  called  degrees.  They  are  usually 
numbered  from  the  first,  or  starting-tone,  called  the  key- 
note, or  key-tone,  from  below  upward.  The  smallest  in- 
terval allowed  among  the  Chinese  is  a  whole  tone.  The 
smallest  in  modern  music  is  a  half  tone.^  Among  the  Per- 
sians quarter  tones  are  allowed. 

"For  rougher  measurements,  then,  we  are  justified  in  assuming 
as  a  unit  whatever  interval  we  find  most  convenient  for  the  pur- 
pose. The  size  of  the  interval  will,  of  course,  depend  on  the 
nature  of  the  music  concerned.  Thus,  in  Hindu  music  the  octave 
is  regarded  as  consisting  of  twenty-two  intervals  (^rutis),  such  that 
nine  of  them  make  a  fourth  and  thirteen  a  fifth,  and  consequently 
four  make  the  major  Whole-tone.  In  Javanese  music  five  approxi- 
mately equal  intervals  compose  the  octave.  But  ancient  Greek 
music,  Uke  modern  European  music,  recognizes  an  octave  of  twelve 
nominally  small  intervals  of  which  five  make  up  the  Fourth  and 
seven  the  Fifth  and  two  the  Tone,  which  is  their  difference.  They 
are,  however,  unlike  in  this,  that,  while  in  modern  music  no  in- 

1  Charles  W.  L.  Johnson:  "Musical  Pitch  and  the  Measurement  of 
Intervals  among  the  Ancient  Greeks"  (Johns  Hopkins  University  dis- 
sertation), p.  17. 

2  This  does  not  mean  that  the  modern  ear  can  not  discriminate  as  to 
intervals  smaller  than  the  half  tone.  Consult,  C.  E.  Seashore:  "The 
Measurement  of  Pitch  Discrimination:  A  Preliminary  Report"  (Psy- 
chological Monograph,  Vol.  XIII.,  1910);  and  T.  F.  Vance:  "Varia- 
tion in  Pitch  Discrimination"  (Psychological  Monographs,  1914,  of 
the  University  of  Iowa  Studies  in  Psychology,  VI). 


PITCH  15 

terval  differing  very  widely  from  the  twelfth  part  of  an  octave  or 
some  multiple  thereof  is  used,  in  ancient  Greek  music  on  the 
contrary,  the  existence  of  various  periods  of  Quarter-  and  Third- 
tones  (equal  to  one-half  and  two-thirds  the  Semi-tone  respec- 
tively) is  well  attested.  For  this  reason  the  Tone  is  perhaps  a 
better  unit  of  rough  measurement  than  the  Semi-tone."  ^ 

In  modern  music  when  the  scale  is  pure,  the  frequencies 
of  tones  that  are  a  whole  tone  apart  bear  to  each  other  the 
ratio  8:9.  The  frequencies  of  tones  a  half  tone  apart  are 
to  each  other  as  24:25  (from  C  to  C:^,  for  instance)  or  as 
15:16  (from  D?  to  C).  The  ear,  however,  is  not  as  exact 
in  its  measurements  as  it  is  usually  conceived  to  be,  so  that 
modern  music  rarely  employs  a  pure  scale,  but  is  satisfied 
with  approximations.  It  makes  use  of  a  tempered  scale, 
—  that  is,  a  scale  in  which  only  very  few  of  the  sounds 
employed  bear  to  each  other  the  actual  mathematical  ratios 
found  in  the  pure  scale.  The  method  of  modern  musical 
notation  takes  into  account  only  whole  tones  and  half 
tones.  Any  degree  of  sound  involving  less  than  a  half 
tone  can  not  be  represented  by  it. 

The  elasticity  of  sounding  bodies  capable  of  producing 
tones  is  such  that  the  bodies  vibrate  not  only  as  wholes 
but  also  in  their  aliquot  parts.  The  law  of  their  vibration 
was  first  definitely  formulated  by  G.  S.  Ohm  of  Munich, 
and  is  known  as  Ohm's  Law  of  Acoustics.  D.  C.  Miller 
gives  the  following  very  convenient  statement  of  this 
law:  — 

"All  musical  tones  are  periodic;  the  human  ear  perceives  pen- 
dular  vibrations  alone  as  simple  tones;  all  varieties  of  tone  quaUty 
are  due  to  particular  combinations  of  a  larger  or  smaller  number 
of  simple  tones;    every  motion  of  the  air  which  corresponds  to  a 

» Charles  W.  L.  Johnson:  "Musical  Pitch  and  the  Measurement  of 
Intervals  among  the  Ancient  Greeks,"  p.  39. 


16       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

complex  musical  tone  or  to  a  composite  mass  of  musical  tones  is 
capable  of  being  analyzed  into  a  sum  of  simple  pendular  vibrations, 
and  to  each  simple  vibration  corresponds  a  simple  tone  which  the 
ear  may  hear."  ^ 

For  instance,  a  violin  string  at  the  same  time  that  it 
vibrates  throughout  its  length,  divides  itself  into  halves, 
thirds,  quarters,  fifths,  etc.,  each  fractional  part  emitting 
its  own  tone  simultaneously  with  the  sound  of  the  funda- 
mental, the  tone  emitted  by  the  vibration  of  the  full  length 
of  the  string.  The  tones  resulting  from  the  vibration  of 
these  fractional  parts  of  the  string  are  variously  known  as 
harmonics,  overtones,  upper  partial  tones  or  more  briefly 
partials.  Koenig  prefers  to  call  them  sounds  of  subdivision, 
as  expressing  their  nature  more  exactly  than  any  of  the 
preceding  terms.  I  find  it  more  convenient,  however,  to 
speak  of  them  simply  as  partials.  The  fractions  of  the 
string  naturally  vibrate  with  greater  frequencies  than 
the  full  length  string.  Beginning  with  the  frequency  of  the 
fundamental  tone,  their  frequencies  are  proportional  to 
the  series  1,  2,  3,  4,  5,  6,  7,  8,  etc.  Although  only  such 
tones  as  are  one  or  more  octaves  ^  from  the  fundamental 
are  in  perfect  tune  with  it  in  our  modern  scale,  the  diagram 
which  follows  expresses  as  accurately  as  is  possible  by 
means  of  musical  notation  the  partials  of  the  fundamental  C2.^ 

^  "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  62. 

*  The  octave  is  "a  tone  of  the  eighth  diatonic  degree  above  or  below 
a  given  tone;  the  next  higher  or  lower  reduplicate  of  a  given  tone."  — 
"The  Century  Dictionary  and  Cyclopedia." 

^  This  diagram  is  taken  from  page  64  of  D.  C.  Miller's  "The  Science 
of  Musical  Sounds."  "The  notes  on  the  staff  represent  the  scale  tones 
which  are  nearest  to  the  overtones."  The  line  a  gives  the  number  of 
the  partials.  The  line  c  gives  the  names  of  the  notes.  The  line  b  gives 
the  frequencies  according  to  the  tempered  scale.  The  line  d  gives  the 
frequencies  according  to  the  pure  scale.  The  fundamental  Cs  is  chosen 
purely  as  a  matter  of  convenience. 


PITCH 


17 


Figure  I 


-rj    -       II       

p"^ tl 

(a) 
(b) 
(c) 
(d) 


12  3   4    5     6     7    8    9    10  11  12  13  14  15  16  17  18  19  20 


OS  O)  00  ^~  t^ 
M  lO  00  -^  ■* 
-H  IM  M  m   to 


^    ,H    O 


to    05    O)    lO    00 
O    r-l    CO    ■*    lO 

(N   IN   N   (N   IM 


C2C3  G3C4  E4  G4  31*4  C5  Dj  Eb  Gbs  Gb  Gtfs  Bt's  B5  Ce  Cffe  De  Ds  Et 


05  05  00  I-.  N 
CM  10  00  i-i  "5 
ri  CM  CO  10   CO 


CM   CO   CO 
CM   O   r-( 


CO   CO   t»   C^   CO   •"! 
■*   lO   CO   05   CM   CO 


CM   CM   CM   CM   CM 


The  interval  from  the  fundamental  to  the  first  partial  is 
an  octave;  from  the  fundamental  to  the  second  partial, 
an  octave  and  a  fifth;  from  the  fundamental  to  the  third 
partial,  two  octaves;  from  the  fundamental  to  the  fourth 
partial,  two  octaves  and  a  major  third;  and  so  on.  Some 
of  the  still  higher  partials  are  not  at  all  agreeable  when 
prominent.  For  this  reason  Koenig  objects  to  their  being 
called  harmonics. 

What  is  true  of  the  vibration  of  the  violin  string  is  true 
of  the  strings  of  all  string  instruments,  and  equally  true 
of  all  wind-instruments,  especially  the  voice.  Of  course, 
in  the  case  of  wind-instruments  it  is  the  vibration  of  a 
column  of  air  which  is  thus  subdivided. 

The  reason  why  the  sounds  of  the  partials  are  not  familiar 
as  such  to  our  ears  is  that  their  sounds  are  normally  very 
faint.  In  order  that  their  presence  may  become  audible, 
some  mechanism  to  aid  in  the  analyzing  of  the  tone  is  usu- 
ally necessary,  though  acute  ears  can  easily  detect  the  more 
prominent  partials. 


18       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

Upon  the  system  of  natural  relationships  furnished  by 
these  partials  modern  European  music  is  based.  Other 
scales  than  ours  likewise  make  use  of  them,  but  to  a  more 
limited  extent. 

The  mathematical  ratios  which  the  tones  of  the  pure 
scale  bear  to  the  tonic,  or  tone  upon  which  any  scale  is  built, 
are  given  in  the  following  diagram. 


Figure  II 

Frequency  of 

Frequency  of 

Tonic  (C)  1         is  to  Major  second   (D) 

as  8  is  to  9 

Tonic  (C) 

'  "  Major  third       (E) 

"    4  "   "    5 

Tonic  (C) 

'  "  Perfect  fourth    (F) 

"    3   "  "    4 

Tonic  (C) 

'  "  Perfect  fifth       (G) 

"    2  "   "    3 

Tonic  (C) 

'  "  Major  sixth        (A) 

"    3   "   "    5 

Tonic  (C) 

'  "  Major  seventh  (B) 

"    8  "  "  15 

If,  now,  I  start  with  C-i  as  having  a  frequency  of  16,^ 
the  frequency  of  G-i  will  be  24;  that  of  E-i,  20.  Suppose 
that  I  next  take  G-i  as  my  tonic.  The  perfect  fifth  of 
that  scale  is  Dq.  Its  pitch  will  be  to  that  of  G-i  as  2:3, 
and  will  have  a  frequency  of  36.  Now,  using  this  D^,  as 
a  tonic,  its  perfect  fifth  is  Ao  with  a  frequency  of  54.  Treat- 
ing this  Aq  in  the  same  manner,  Ei,  its  perfect  fifth,  will 
have  a  frequency  of  81.  The  same  Ei  in  the  scale  of  C, 
from  which  we  started,  has  a  frequency  of  80.  On  the  piano 
or  the  organ,  these  tones  are  one  and  the  same,  though  the 
El  in  the  key  of  C  has  a  frequency  of  80  and  Ei  in  the  key 
of  A  has  a  frequency  of  81.  A  diagram  may  help  to  make 
this  clearer. 

*  I  have  used  C  as  tonic  merely  for  convenience  of  illustration.  Any 
other  tone  might  have  served  just  as  well. 

''  What  pitch  shall  be  used  as  a  standard  is  purely  arbitrary.  Dif- 
ferent pitches  have  been  used  at  different  times.  International  Pitch 
is  really  16.17.  For  rough  measurements  it  is  just  as  well  to  drop  the 
fraction. 


PITCH 


19 


Figure  III 


z^i: 


:5* 


@1 


Fp 


U~ 


C-1-&-1Q 


—         -r5i-54 

~  =1*^36         Do  ^36 

-s>-  24     G_i  -fi--  24 


Ao  -s?-  54 


=      =C.--^64^-^-S0 
=  Co-^32 
C_i  ^- 16 


^^ag 


-—      El  -s>-  81 
Ao-is>-54 


Finally,  the  point  is  reached  where  Btt,  which  on  the 
piano  is  the  same  as  C,  is  almost  half  a  tone  higher  than  C.^ 
Obviously,  then,  with  scales  built  upon  exact  mathematical 
proportions,  it  is  impossible  to  pass  from  some  keys  to  some 
others.  As  the  ear  will  accept  as  true  intervals  which  are 
not  true,^  Johann  Sebastian  Bach  (1685-1750)  suggested 
that  the  pure  scale  be  altered  in  such  a  way  as  to  distribute 
among  all  the  tones  of  all  the  scales  the  discrepancy  which 
is  most  apparent  between  the  keys  of  Btf  and  C.  This  slight 
changing  of  the  pitch  of  each  tone  is  known  as  tempering 
the  scale,  and  the  resulting  scale  as  the  tempered  scale.  It 
is  this  scale  which    is  in  use   today.     Although  very  few 

1  J.  P.  N.  Land  says  in  "Recherches  sur  I'histoire  de  la  Gamme 
Arabe,"  Acles  du  6^^  Congr.  Intern,  des  Orientals,  part  ii,  sect.  1,  p.  37: 
"Arabian  lutenists  use  seventeen  notes  within  the  octave.  They  dis- 
tinguish between  sharps  and  flats;  and  their  diatonic  scales  would  show 
such  a  difference  as  that  which  exists  between  the  scales  of  BS  and  C, 
whereas  with  us  the  difference  is  only  theoretical." 

^W.  VanDyke  Bingham:  "Studies  in  Melody,"  p.  21,  par.  11. 
(Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  XII.,  No.  3.  Jan.,  1910,  Review 
Publishing  Co.,  Lancaster,  Pa.) 


20        THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

persons  would  notice  the  fact,  the  octaves  are  the  only  in- 
tervals which  are  exactly  in  tune.  However,  what  has 
been  lost  in  accuracy  and  brilliancy  of  pitch  is  made  up  for 
by  greater  facility  in  passing  from  one  key  to  another,  or 
modulating,  as  it  is  called.  Thus  it  has  come  about  that 
even  upon  instruments  of  fixed  intonation,  like  the  piano 
and  the  organ,  it  is  now  possible  to  produce  all  the  keys  of 
both  the  major  and  the  minor  modes. 

To  say  that  modern  music  employs  tones  exhibiting  the 
mathematical  ratios  expressed  in  the  following  table  is  to 
state  a  fact;  but  in  this  instance  the  fact  offers  no  clue  to 
the  why  or  the  wherefore.  It  gives  no  explanation  of  our 
preference  of  one  pitch  to  another  or  of  one  set  of  pitches 
to  another  set,  nor  of  how  or  why,  during  the  process  of 

Pure  Tempered 

Prime  or  unison (C  to  C,  F  to  F)  1:1  1:1 

Augmented  prime. .  .  (C  to  Ctt,  F  to  F#)  24 :25 

Minor  second (C  to  Db,  F  to  Gb)  15:16 

Major  second (C  to  D,  F  to  G)  8:9  (9:10)  l:2i 

Augmented  second. .  (C  to  DS,  F  to  GS)  64:75 

Minor  third (C  to  Eb,  F  to  Ab)       5:6 

Major  third (C  to  E,  F  to  A)  4:5  1:2^ 

Perfect  fourth (C  to  F,  F  to  Bb)         3 :4  1 :2^ 

Augmented  fourth   .  (C  to  Fi^,  F  to  Bb)  32:45  (18:25)  \  .,^i 

Diminished  fifth ....  (C  to  Gb,  F  to  Cb)  45:64  (25:36)  J     "  ^ 

Perfect  fifth (C  to  G,  F  to  C)  2:3  1  ■2^ 

Augmented  fifth ....  (C  to  Gtt,  F  to  Ctt)  16 :25  1  ,  .^i 

Minor  sixth (C  to  Ab,  F  to  Db)      5:8    J  '  ^ 

Major  sixth (C  to  A,  F  to  D)  3:5  1:2| 

Augmented  sixth ...  (C  to  Att,  F  to  D#)  128:225         )  ..^5 

Minor  seventh (C  to  Bb,  F  to  Eb)       9:16  (5:9)  J        "  ^ 

Major  seventh (C  to  B,  F  to  E)  8:15 

Diminished  octave. .  (C  to  G'b,  F  to  F'b)  135:256 

Octave (C  to  C',  F  to  F)  1:2  1:2 


1:2  iV 

l:2i 

l:2i 


2 


PITCH  21 

selection,  as  well  as  after  it  has  taken  place,  the  phenom- 
enon of  pitch  finds  use  in  melody.  Modern  ears  agree 
that  certain  successions  and  combinations  of  pitches  are 
pleasant,  others  unpleasant.  Some  may  prefer  a  given 
tone  a  little  sharp  or  a  little  flat;^  but,  in  the  main,  what 
one  ear  will  accept,  all  will  accept.  How  does  it  happen, 
then,  that  such  a  ratio  of  frequencies  of  pitches  as  that 
presented  above  is  the  particular  series  in  which  we  find 
most  satisfaction?  The  physicist  was  the  first  to  attempt 
an  answer  to  this  question.  Both  the  psychologist  and 
the  anthropologist  have  since  attacked  the  problem,  each 
from  his  own  point  of  view;  but  it  is  probable,  that,  even 
after  both  have  had  their  say,  the  complete  explanation 
has  not  yet  been  found. 

Almost  every  one  has  noticed,  that,  when  two  tuning 
forks  are  not  quite  in  unison,  a  peculiar  throbbing,  pulsating 
effect  is  experienced  in  the  ears.  These  pulsations  are 
known  as  heats.  "The  more  closely  the  forks  agree,  the 
slower  are  the  beats.  When  complete  unison  is  attained, 
they  disappear.  With  increased  difference  of  pitch  on  the 
other  hand,  the  rapidity  of  the  beats  increases  until  they 
come  too  fast  to  be  distinguished.  The  result  is  then  dis- 
cord." ^  Beats  are  due  to  the  combining  of  sound  waves 
from  two  vibrating  bodies  at  one  moment  to  strengthen 
and  at  the  next  to  annul  each  other.  If,  for  example,  two 
tuning  forks,  one  vibrating  255  times  a  second  and  the 
other  256,  are  sounding  simultaneously,  they  will  give  rise 
to  one  beat  each  second,  because  once  in  each  second  the 

1  Professor  Max  Meyer  in  "Contributions  to  a  Psychological  Theory 
of  Music,"  University  of  Missouri  Studies,  1901,  I.,  1-80,  has  worked 
out  very  carefully  the  ratios  which  his  ear  prefers.  See  also  C.  Stumpf 
and  M.  Meyer,  "  Maassbestimmungen  liber  die  Reinheit  consonanter 
Intervalle,"  Zeits.  f.  Psychol,  1898,  18,  321. 

2E.  L.  Nichols:   "Outlines  of  Physics"  (Macmillan,  1907). 


22        THE  FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

two  wave-systems  will  coincide  and  produce  a  maximum 
sound,  and  once  they  will  be  half  a  wave-length  apart  and 
the  sound  will  disappear.  "When  the  beats  are  few,  the 
separate  pulsations  are  easily  detected.  When  the  beats 
are  many,  the  ear  does  not  perceive  the  separate  pulses, 
and  instead  the  sensation  is  that  of  a  third  tone,  which  is 
as  distinct  and  as  musical  as  the  two  generating  tones, 
and  which  has  a  frequency  equal  to  the  difference  in  the 
frequencies  of  the  two  generators;  that  is,  its  frequency  is 
equal  to  the  number  of  beats  if  such  beats  could  be  heard. 
This  tone  is  called  a  beat-tone."  ^ 

Only  sounds  of  such  frequencies,  then,  as  will  combine 
without  producing  beats  can  furnish  the  tonal  basis  for  the 
construction  of  a  scale  like  ours.  Such  a  basis  is  offered 
by  the  major  triad,  —  that  is,  a  chord  consisting  of  the 
tonic,  the  major  third,  and  the  perfect  fifth.  These,  it 
should  be  observed,  are  the  first  partials  of  any  fundamental. 
They  do  not  produce  beats,  because  the  ratios  of  their 
frequencies,  being  simple  numbers,  are  such,  that,  although 
the  sound  waves  first  reinforce  and  then  tend  to  lessen  each 
other,  they  never  annul  each  other,  but  are  absorbed  in 
the  same  uniformly  progressing  wave  crest  and  trough  of 
atmosphere. 

Physically  the  relation  of  tones  probably  depends  upon 
to  what  extent  the  upper  partials  of  two  tones  coincide. 
Tones  which  have  but  a  distant  relation  to  each  other, 
however,  are  often  closely  related  to  a  third  tone,  and  then, 
particularly  if  they  are  associated  in  some  melodic  series, 
may  acquire  a  close  relationship.  This,  together  with  the 
fact  that  two  tones  are  often  felt  to  be  related  merely  be- 
cause of  their  nearness  to  each  other,  is  sometimes  made  to 
account  for  the  association  in  the  same  scale  of  such  beat- 

1  D.  C.  Miller:  "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  183.  See  also, 
Zahm:  "Sound  and  Music,"  pp.  322-340  (Chicago,  1892). 


PITCH  23 

producing  intervals  as  the  tonic  and  the  major  second  or 
the  tonic  and  the  major  seventh.^ 

It  must  not  be  thought,  however,  that  in  the  construc- 
tion of  the  diatonic  scale  there  was  involved  any  such  con- 
scious process  as  I  have  described.^  The  building  of  the 
scale  must  have  been  a  matter  of  gradual  accretion  through 
ages  and  ages,  though  I  suppose  that  its  origin  might  possibly 
be  conceded  to  lie  in  the  sex  cries  of  the  anthropoid  animal.^ 
"At  the  very  bottom  of  the  process  of  development,"  says 
Hubert  H.  Parry ,^  ''are  those  savage  howls  which  have 
hardly  any  distinct  notes  in  them  at  all.  Many  travelers 
record  such  things,  and  try  to  represent  them  in  the  Euro- 
pean musical  stave.  For  instance,  the  natives  of  Australia 
are  described  by  a  French  traveler  as  beginning  a  howl  on 
a  pitch  note  and  descending  a  full  octave  in  semitones." 
Parry,  however,  does  not  believe  this  to  be  an  accurate 
description  of  the  process,  "as  a  downward  scale  of  correct 
semitones  is  beyond  the  powers  of  any  but  very  highly 
trained  singers.  In  all  such  cases  the  process  must  have 
been  a  gliding  of  the  voice  up  or  down,  without  notes  that 
were  strictly  defined  either  in  relation  to  one  another  or  to 
any  general  principle." 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  very  first  step  in  the  proc- 
ess is  not  of  vital  concern  to  my  argument,  however.  For 
it  is  a  mere  matter  of  theory  that  can  be  passed  over  in 

1  Hermann  von  Helmholtz:  "Sensations  of  Tone,"  p.  256  and  p.  350. 
(Translated  by  A.  J.  Ellis,  second  English  edition,  London,  1885.) 

Geza  Revesz:  "Zur  Grundlegung  der  Tonspsychologie"  (Veit  und 
Co.,  Leipzig,  1913). 

^  Henry  T.  Moore:  "The  Genetic  Aspects  of  Consonance  and  Dis- 
sonance." 

» Charles  Darwin:  "Descent  of  Man,"  2d  ed.,  p.  299  and  p.  358. 
To  me  in  these  cries  appears  to  lie  the  origin  of  language  rather  than  of 
music.     See  Richard  Wallaschek:    "Primitive  Music,"  pp.  240-259. 

*  "The  Art  of  Music,"  p.  53. 


24   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

consideration  of  the  fact  that  savages  in  all  parts  of  the 
globe,  where  they  have  music  involving  the  use  of  tones  at 
all,  usually  fix  upon  a  monotone  above  and  below  which 
their  voices  rise  and  fall  to  other  pitches  of  more  or  less 
definiteness.^  This  rude  singing  may  or  may  not  involve 
the  use  of  words;  but  in  no  instance  are  rhythmic  move- 
ments of  the  body  and  rhythmic  accompaniment  on  some 
instrument  of  percussion  lacldng,  so  that  for  man  the 
process  seems  to  be  from  rhythm  to  melody.  Birds,  as 
well  as  numerous  animals,  employ  sounds  that  are  musical; 
but  nowhere  in  the  animal  kingdom  except  with  man  is  the 
unifying  principle  of  rhythm  present.  The  instinct  for 
race  preservation  gives  rise  to  communal  action.  Among 
savages  those  tribes  which  are  most  in  the  habit  of 
engaging  in  mimic  warfare  and  mimic  hunts  are  invariably 
the  dominant  tribes.  Practice  in  concerted  rhythmic 
movement  fits  them  to  act  together  in  the  struggle  against 
their  neighbors  and  against  nature.  Without  some  unify- 
ing element,  concerted  action  is  impossible.  This  element 
is  first  found  in  rhythm.  Later  a  unit  tone  is  fixed  upon, 
and  to  this  tone  other  tones  are  gradually  added.  Fre- 
quently this  unit  tone  is  that  of  the  drum  upon  which  they 
are  in  the  habit  of  beating.  As  soon  as  a  pipe  of  any  kind 
is  added  to  their  orchestra,  the  foundation  for  the  building 
of  a  scale  is  prepared.  Pipes  can  produce  only  certain 
tones.  Therefore,  the  voice  gradually  settles  to  the  use 
of  those  tones  produced  by  the  pipes.  Wallaschek  is  prob- 
ably right  in  ascribing  to  the  limitations  enforced  by  the 

1  Mary  Eugenia  and  Adams  William  Brown:  "Musical  Instruments 
and  their  Homes,"  pp.  242-243. 

Theodor  Baker:  "Uber  die  Musik  der  Nordamerikanischen  Wilden," 
pp.  18-19. 

Lewis  H.  Morgan:  "The  League  of  the  Ho-d6-no-san-nee,  or 
Iroquois"  p.  289. 


PITCH  25 

use  of  instruments  the  origin  of  a  regular  scale.*  In  the 
first  stages  of  musical  development  savages  are  not  at  all 
particular  about  what  these  pitches  shall  be.  With  increase 
of  mechanical  skill  in  constructing  their  pipes,  they  begin 
to  show  a  tendency  toward  selection,  until  finally  a  scale  of 
some  kind  is  built  up.  This  seems  to  me  a  logical  explana- 
tion, especially  when  attention  is  called  to  a  similar  proc- 
ess in  the  development  of  modern  music.  The  limitations 
set  by  the  pianoforte  and  the  pipe-organ  have  forced  us  to 
adopt  a  modified  scale  with  which  most  ears  are  at  least 
tolerably  well  satisfied,  especially  if  they  have  never  heard 
the  pure  scale.  The  tendency,  however,  is  always  toward 
the  avoidance  of  those  tones  which,  when  sounded  in 
unison,  produce  beats. 

As  the  result  of  hearing  the  same  tones  together  repeat- 
edly, the  mind  begins  to  associate  the  sounds  and  to  regard 
them  as  related.  Conscious  art  begins.  The  individual 
musician  takes  the  place  of  communal  production  of  music. 
Through  special  skill  he  is  able  to  stand  apart  from  the 
crowd,  yet  at  the  same  time  to  draw  the  community  to- 
gether in  a  bond  of  unified  emotion.  Once  the  function  of 
musician  has  become  specialized,  progress  is  rapid;  but  it 
never  moves  more  rapidly  than  the  mind  of  the  community 
is  able  to  assimilate  the  added  tones  and  to  find  pleasure 
in  them.  Finally,  there  appears  a  Bach  or  a  Wagner,  who 
through  the  power  of  genius  is  strong  enough  to  force  upon 
his  generation  his  own  standards  of  tone.  At  first  opposi- 
tion is  tremendous.  The  new  combinations  are  felt  to  be 
unrelated,  disagreeable,  noisy.  Repeated  hearings  render 
them  familiar,  pleasing,  musical.  And  so  progress  con- 
tinues. But  it  is  progress  brought  about,  first,  by  restric- 
tion to  a  unit,  and,  then,  by  the  gradual  addition  of  other 
sounds  to  this  unit  and  their  coordination  with  it  and  with 
1  Richard  Wallaschek:  "Primitive  Music,"  pp.  156-159. 


26        THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

one  another.  Whether  the  introduction  of  new  tones  and 
new  combinations  of  tones  be  fortuitous  or  dehberate, 
the  advance  in  conununal  iesthetic  appreciation  must  be 
either  simultaneous  with  each  addition  or  must  lag  so  slightly 
behind  that  the  musician  may  not  be  altogether  without  an 
audience.  For  the  audience  can  never  be  entirely  lack- 
ing, even  though  at  times  it  appears  to  have  been  restricted 
to  only  the  musician  himself.  Both  speech  and  music 
have  always  been,  and  must  continue  to  be,  communal  in 
essence.  They  exist  because  of  the  desire  of  the  individual 
to  communicate  to  others  his  ideas  and  his  emotions  and 
to  share  theirs  with  them. 

In  the  triangular  controversy  carried  on  by  Darwin,^ 
Spencer,^  and  Wallaschek,^  as  to  the  origin  of  music,  several 
points  called  attention  to  by  Wallaschek  seem  to  be  so  per- 
tinent that  I  cannot  refrain  from  quoting  them  here :  — 

"Whereas  Mr.  Spencer  .  .  .  seems  to  think  that  musical  modu- 
lation originates  in  the  modulations  of  speech,  I  maintain  that  it 
arises  directly  from  the  rhythmical  impulse.  .  .  .  Even  admitting 
the  present  reciprocity  of  influence  in  both  music  and  speech,  I 
doubt  that  such  is  the  origin,  and  that  for  several  reasons. 

I.  "We  find  even  in  the  most  primitive  state  of  culture  a  sort 
of  recitative,  side  by  side  with  a  kind  of  music,  in  which  the  rh3rthm 
alone  plays  a  leading  part,  and  with  songs,  the  words  of  which  are 
perfectly  meaningless  or  at  least  can  not  be  understood  by  the 
tribe  in  question.''    In  such   circumstances  it  is  obviously  impos- 

1  Charles  Darwin:    "The  Descent  of  Man,"  ii,  pp.  68-74. 

2  Herbert  Spencer:   "On  the  Origin  and  Function  of  Music." 

3  Richard  Wallaschek:    "Primitive  Music,"  pp.  237-259. 

*  Theodor  Baker:  "tJber  die  Musik  der  Nordamerikanischen  Wil- 
den,"  p.  7. 

Lewis  H.  Morgan:  "League  of  the  Ho-de-no-san-nee,  or  Iroquois," 
p.  2ff. 

Krehbiel  in  " Afro- American  Folk  Songs"  says  that  the  meaning- 
less words  employed  in  the  songs  of  the  American  negroes  are  in  many 


PITCH  27 

sible  for  the  musical  modulations  to  have  taken  rise  from  the 
spoken  modulations,  since  there  is  no  genuine  speech  in  the  case. 
Among  savages  primitive  vocal  music  reveals  in  many  cases  no 
connection  with  language,  but  is  simply  a  succession  of  musical 
sounds  sung  by  the  voice.  .  .  . 

II.  "Primitive  music  can  not  have  evolved  from  modulations 
of  the  voice  in  emotional  speech,  as  the  most  primitive  music  is 
in  so  many  cases  no  modulation  of  tone  but  merely  a  rhythmical 
movement  in  one  tone.  .  .  . 

III.  "Speech  expressed  in  song  does  not  develop  at  the  same 
rate  as  speech  itself;  on  the  contrary,  the  intellectual  importance 
of  singing  declines  with  the  higher  development  of  language. 
Examples  of  a  word  changing  its  meaning  with  a  different  vocal 
inflection  are  only  to  be  met  with  in  primitive  language.  .  .  . 

IV.  "Music  is  the  expression  of  emotion,  speech  the  expression 
of  thought.  If  we  assume  that  music  originates  in,  and  is  devel- 
oped from,  speech,  we  must  also  assume  that  emotion  is  developed 
from  thought.  It  may  be  that  in  the  adult  human  organism 
particular  emotions  do  arise  in  this  way,  but  it  is  not  true  of  emo- 
tions generally.  Moreover,  many  cases  of  aphasia  prove  that  an 
expression  cannot  be  emotional  and  intellectual  at  the  same  time, 
the  one  kind  of  expression  arising  in  and  spreading  through  dif- 
ferent parts  of  the  brain  and  nervous  system  from  those  occupied 
by  the  other.^  It  may  be,  however,  that  in  a  very  primitive  stage 
of  mental  development  thought  and  emotion  have  not  yet  become 
clearly  differentiated.  ...  I  think  then  that  music  and  speech 
did  not  arise  the  one  from  the  other,  but  that  both  arose  from  (or 
together  with)  an  identical  primitive  stage  in  one  of  their  common 
elements.     Hence  it  happens  that  inquiring  into  the  origin  of  music 

cases  vestiges  of  songs  formerly  sung  in  Africa,  the  ear  retaining  the 
sound  of  the  words  though  their  meaning  has  been  forgotten.  Meaning- 
less words  used  as  padding  seem  to  be  common  to  all  ballad  literature. 
1  Richard  Wallaschek:  "Uber  die  Bedeutung  der  Aphasie  fiir  den 
musikalischen  Ausdruck,"  Vierielj.  f.  Musikwissenschaft,  VII.,  Heft  i, 
Jahrg.,  1891;  and  "Das  musikalische  Gedachtnis  bei  Katalepsie,  im 
Traum,  in  der  Hypnose,"  Viertelj.  f.  Musikwissenschaft,  VIII.,  Heft  iii. 
Jahrg.,  1892. 


28   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

we  necessarily  come  into  contact  with  the  primitive  language, 
and  in  inquiring  into  the  origin  of  speech  we  come  into  contact 
with  primitive  music,  or,  more  correctly  speaking,  with  the  cor- 
responding sounds.  Primitive  human  utterance,  using  sound 
metaphors  and  onomatopoeia  in  order  to  make  itself  intelligible, 
may  resemble  primitive  musical  tones;  yet  nevertheless  an  early 
separation  of  distinct  tones  and  indistinct  sounds  seems  to  have 
taken  place,  not  as  transition  from  the  one  as  prior  to  the 
other  as  succeeding,  but  as  a  divergence  from  a  primitive  state 
which  is,  strictly  speaking,  neither  of  the  two.  ...  It  is  just 
this  power  of  uttering,  no  matter  what,  that  enables  it  [the  human 
child,  or,  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  the  savage]  in  course 
of  time  to  evolve  a  faculty  both  for  singing  and  speaking.  ...  It 
is  as  difficult  to  tell  whether  a  primitive  utterance  is  sufficiently 
developed  to  be  called  musical  as  to  know  whether  it  can  properly 
be  called  language  or  not.  This  perhaps  is  the  reason  why  Mr. 
Darwin  and  Mr.  Spencer  do  not  agree  on  the  question  as  to  which 
comes  first,  music  or  language.  'Spencer,'  said  Darwin,  'comes 
to  an  exactly  opposite  conclusion  to  that  at  which  I  arrived.  He 
concludes,  as  Diderot  did  formerly,  that  the  cadences  used  in 
emotional  speech  afford  the  foundation  from  which  music  has  devel- 
oped, whilst  I  conclude  that  musical  notes  become  firmly  [I  should 
rather  say,  possibly]  associated  with  some  of  the  strongest  passions 
an  animal  is  capable  of  feeling.'  I  think  Darwin's  mistake  in  the 
sentence  here  quoted  hes  in  his  speaking  of  music,  instead  of  musi- 
cal sounds,  i.e.,  sounds  which  come  to  be  used  later  in  music."  ^ 

Some  of  even  the  most  rudimentary  songs  do  contain 
words;  but  the  words  are  lacking  almost  entirely  in  sig- 
nificance, and  at  best  are  hardly  more  than  the  monotonous 
repetition  of  a  single  phrase  or  of  a  very  short  sentence. 
The  intellectual  element  is  so  negligible  as  to  be  of  no  con- 
sequence except  in  showing  that  germination  is  already  in 
process.  Music  and  verse  continue  to  develop  in  a  single 
trunk,  until,  with  the  further  strengthening  of  the  intellec- 

1  Richard  Wallaschek:   "Primitive  Music,"  pp.  251-255. 


PITCH  29 

tual  fiber,  the  tree  begins  to  fork;  yet  never  do  the  two  main 
branches  separate  so  widely  that  their  twigs  are  not  every- 
where most  inseparably  interlaced.  Speech  brought  under 
rhythmic  control^  may  result  either  in  music  or  in  verse, 
according  to  the  degree  of  prominence  now  assumed  by  a 
second  factor,  —  melody. 

The  problem  of  melody  has  received  special  attention 
at  the  hands  of  four  psychologists,  —  Fritz  Weinmann,^ 
Theodor  Lipps,^  Max  Meyer,^  and  W.  Van  Dyke  Bingham.^ 
"Into  the  determination  of  the  total  psychosis  of  melody," 
pitch,  time  rhythm,  tempo,  tone-color,  and  intensity  must 
all  enter.  A  change  in  any  one  of  these  will  alter  the  effect 
of  the  melody  in  some  degree;  yet  the  determining  factor 
is  so  predominantly  a  matter  of  pitch  that  the  problem  re- 
solves itself  into  a  discussion  of  how  a  series  of  discreet  tonal 
stimuli  can  arouse  that  feeling  of  unity  upon  which  Bingham 
lays  so  much  emphasis  in  the  following  definition :  —  A 
melody  is  "a  succession  of  musical  sounds  which  is  felt  to 
constitute  an  (Esthetic  unity,  a  unity  toward  the  establishment 
of  which  pitch  relations  of  the  successive  tones  contribute."* 

'  With  Verrier's  contention  ("Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  metrique 
anglaise, "  III.,  p.  71,  4  Rue  Bernard,  Palissy,  Paris,  1910)  that  the 
origin  of  verse  is  to  be  found  neither  in  the  rhythm  of  work  nor  in  the 
rhythm  of  dancing,  but  in  the  prose  "segments"  of  everyday  con- 
versation, I  do  not  agree  at  all. 

2  "Zur  Struktur  der  Melodie,"  Zeits.f.  Psychol,  1904. 

^"Zur  Theorie  der  Melodie,"  Zeits.f.  Psychologic,  1902;  also  his 
" Psychologisches  Studien,"  2te  Aufl.,  1905,  and  "Grundlegung  der 
Aesthetik,"  1903. 

*  "Unscientific  Methods  in  Musical  Esthetics,"  Journal  of  Phil.  Psy., 
and  S.  M.,  1904;  also  "  Elements  of  a  Psychological  Theory  of  Melody," 
Psych.  Rev.,  VII.,  1900. 

*  "Studies  in  Melody,"  Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  XII.,  No.  3, 
Jan.  1910,  Whole  Number  50,  Psychological  Review,  Review  Publishing 
Co.,  Lancaster,  Pa. 

*  W.  VanDyke  Bingham:   "Studies  in  Melody,"  p.  5. 


30       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

Weinmann,  Lipps,  and  Meyer  differ  with  one  another  and 
with  Lipps  as  to  what  constitutes  a  melody;  yet,  after  all, 
the  difference  is  not  irreconcilable.  Lipps  and  Weinmann 
limit  their  conception  of  melody  to  such  aesthetic  tonal 
units  as  subordinate  the  constituent  elements  to  a  single 
dominating  tonic.  This  excludes  all  melodies  which  are 
lacking  in  tonality,  and  automatically  places  in  the  center 
of  attention  only  modern  diatonic  European  music.  Meyer 
opposes  this  idea  of  a  dominant  tonality.  To  him  a  melody 
is  a  unity  because  we  experience  relationship  between  the 
tones.  However,  he  uses  relationship  in  the  technical, 
musical  sense  of  the  word,  —  that  is,  only  such  tones  as 
bear  to  each  other  the  same  ratio  as  is  borne  to  each  other 
by  a  fundamental,  and  any  one  of  its  several  partials  are 
regarded  as  related} 

''The  matter  of  prime  importance,"  however,  says  Bing- 
ham,^ "is,  of  course,  to  realize  that  by  whatever  names  they 
may  be  called,  we  are  confronted  with  three  different  phe- 
nomena —  relationship,  phrase-  or  period-unity,  tonality 
—  which,  no  matter  how  intimately  they  may  prove  to  be 
bound  together,  are  nevertheless  in  introspection  clearly 
distinguishable,  and  must  not  be  confused."  For  the  sake 
of  clearness,  therefore,  it  is  better  to  regard  a  melody  as 
"a  succession  of  musical  sounds  which  is  felt  to  constitute  an 
(Esthetic  unity."  Any  smaller  or  less  completely  developed 
group  of  musical  sounds  should  not  be  thought  of  as  a 
melody,  but  as  a  melodic  fragment,  if  the  pitches  are  definite, 

^  Following  the  example  of  Bingham,  wherever  the  word  is  used  in 
this  technical  sense,  I  shall  write  it  in  italics.  When  it  is  not  so  written, 
it  is  being  used  in  the  popular  understanding  of  that  term.  In  the  latter 
sense  two  tones  are  said  to  be  related  to  each  other  because  they  have 
frequently  been  heard  together,  or  because  one  is  felt  to  be  higher  or 
lower  than  the  other. 

2  "Studies  in  Melody,"  p.  3. 


PITCH  31 

or  as  a  primitive  melody,^  if  the  pitches  are  uniform  or  ran- 
dom or  indefinite.  Speech  tunes  are  melodies  of  the  ran- 
dom, indefinite,  or  primitive  type.^  "Indeed,"  to  quote 
Bingham  again,  "the  infinite  variety  of  delicately  expres- 
sive inflections  which  enrich  our  spoken  intercourse  must 
be  recognized  as  based  upon  pitch  relations  of  this  'in- 
definite' kind.  The  gross  difference  between  the  rising  in- 
terrogative inflection  and  the  falling  assertatory  is  the  most 
obvious  example  of  this  type  of  melodic  relationship.  The 
mental  effects  produced  by  mere  rise  in  the  pitch  have 
been  described  by  Meyer  in  terms  of  effects  upon  the  at- 
tention." ' 

"A  rise  in  pitch  causes  the  hearer's  attention  to  become  strained, 
and  the  more  so,  the  steeper  the  ascent,  if  I  may  use  this  expres- 
sion. A  fall  in  pitch,  on  the  other  hand,  causes  a  relaxation  of 
attention,  a  cessation  of  mental  activity.  .  .  .  The  same  strain 
and  relaxation  of  attention  is  to  be  found  in  music.  The  normal 
end  of  a  mental  process  is,  of  course,  characterized  not  by  strained, 
but  by  relaxed  attention;  for  strained  attention  means  continued 
mental  activity.  It  is  natural  therefore  that  a  melody  ends  with 
a  falling  inflection."  •* 

"If  one  carefully  examines  different  melodic  intervals  to  dis- 
cover whether  there  may  not  be  still  other  types  of  relation,  he 
will  probably  disclose  to  himself  a  phenomenon  which  has  received 
much  attention  at  the  hands  of  certain  writers.  He  will  notice 
that  many  melodic  intervals  exhibit  a  pecuUar  character  which 
shows  itself  as  a  tendency  for  us  to  prefer  one  of  the  two  tones  aa 
an  end-tone.    The  interval  of  a  minor  third,  whose  tones  have  the 

1  Good  examples  are  instanced  by  B.  I.  Gilman  in  "Hopi  Songs," 
Jour,  of  Am.  Ethnol.  and  ArcheoL,  1905,  5,  14  and  224.  I  have  heard 
these  Indians  sing. 

2  Sidney  Lanier:  "The  Science  of  English  Verse,"  pp.  251-279 
(Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  New  York,  1907). 

3  "Studies  in  Melody,"  pp.  10-11. 

*  Max  Meyer:  Amer.  Jour.  Psych.,  1903,  14,  456. 


32        THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

vibration  ratio  of  5:6,  possesses  no  such  attribute:  one  acquiesces 
indifferently  in  either  as  the  upper  or  the  lower  final  tone.  Neither 
tone  has  any  very  positive  characteristics  about  it.  Not  so,  how- 
ever, with  the  perfect  fifth  (2:3).  If  one  hears  it  as  an  ascending 
interval,  he  is  dissatisfied,  uneasy,  and  under  more  or  less  tension 
until  he  hears  the  first  tone  over  again.  But  if  it  is  a  descending 
fifth  which  he  hears,  there  is  acquiescence,  satisfaction,  repose, 
and  no  desire  to  hear  the  second  tone  a  second  time.  One  may 
say  that  one  of  these  tones  stands  to  the  other  in  relationship  of 
'tonic,'  or  end-tone.  This  aspect  of  musical  intervals  will  be  called 
by  the  present  writer  their  melodic  trend."  ^ 

A  consideration  of  melodic  trend  gives  rise  to  the  Law 
of  the  Return,  which  is:  Where  other  things  are  equal,  it  is 
better  to  return  to  any  starting  point  than  not  to  return.  It 
seems  to  be  impossible  for  us  to  construct  an  organic,  melodic 
whole  unless  we  have  become  habituated  to  the  tone  suc- 
cessions. To  enjoy  them  we  must  be  able  in  some  measure 
to  anticipate  them.  Further,  we  show  (1)  a  decided  "pref- 
erence for  lower  tones  as  such  for  end-tones  (phenomenon 
of  the  falling  inflection),  (2)  a  preference  for  the  return  of 
the  first  tone  as  an  end-tone,  (3)  preference  for  the  expected 
ending  (if  one  knows  that  a  given  tone  is  to  be  the  last,  its 
arrival  may  be  sufficient  to  arouse  the  feeling  of  finality 
quite  apart  from  the  operation  of  any  other  factors),  and, 
finally  (4)  preference  for  an  end  on  one  of  the  tones  of  the 
tonic  chord  —  and  especially  the  tonic  itself  —  of  the  sug- 
gested tonality."  ^ 

"The  closing  tone  institutes  a  response  which  is  not  wholly 
a  new  reaction  but  which  is,  on  the  contrary,  the  completion  of 
an  act  already  in  progress.  The  feeling  of  finaUty  arises  only 
when  the  completion  of  the  act  issues  in  a  muscular  relaxation 
which  is  a  dying  out  of  balanced  tensions.    The  facts  regarding 

1  "Studies  in  Melody,"  pp.  10-11. 

^  W.  Van  Dyke  Bingham:   "Studies  in  Melody,"  p.  41. 


PITCH  33 

those  finality  effects  which  are  due  to  the  falling  inflection  also 
coincide  with  such  a  view.  Rise  in  pitch  is  not  merely  a  result 
of  increased  tension  of  the  vocal  apparatus:  it  likewise  produces 
increased  muscular  tension  in  the  hearer.  A  falling  inflection  at 
the  close  consequently  serves  to  hasten  the  relaxation  process 
which  marks  the  completion  of  the  melody. 

"Finally,  a  motor  theory  of  melody  makes  possible  an  unam- 
biguous statement  of  the  nature  of  melodic  relationship.  Two  or 
more  tones  are  said  to  be  related  when  there  is  community  of 
organized  response.  Unrelated  pitches  fall  apart  because  each 
demands  its  own  separate  attentive  act  of  adjustment;  but  with 
related  tones  the  attitude  which  appears  as  a  response  to  the  first 
is  a  preparation  for  the  response  to  the  second  and  is  completed, 
not  destroyed,  by  that  response.  The  feeling  of  relationship  is 
the  feehng  that  arises  when  the  tones  eUcit  reactions  which  are 
in  some  measure  common.  When,  on  the  other  hand,  the  first 
tone  calls  up  one  set  of  associates  and  estabUshes  a  certain  attitude 
or  organization  of  incipient  tendencies,  while  the  second  tone 
tends  to  call  up  a  set  of  associates  and  estabUshes  an  attitude 
which  is  at  variance  with  the  first,  there  can  be  no  adequacy  of 
coordinated  response  and  the  feeUng  of  relationship  is  prevented 
from  arising."  ^ 

The  feeling  of  relationship  is  due  to  both  sensory  and 
associative  forces.  Consonance  results  from  sounds  that 
require  a  relatively  simple  response  on  the  part  of  the  ear 
to  stimuli  which  are  more  or  less  similar,  or  even  identical. 
One  race,  one  age,  and  even  the  same  individual  undergo 
constant  change  in  ability  to  associate,  amplify,  and  or- 
ganize sounds.  Constantly  hearing  a  certain  succession 
of  pitches  develops  the  ability  to  recognize  them  and  to 
respond  to  them,  so  that  they  finally  come  to  be  felt  as 
related. 

"The  unity,  then,  which  marks  the  difference  between  a  mere 
succession  of  discrete  tonal  stimuU  and  a  melody,  arises  not  from 
1  W.  Van  Dyke  Bingham:  "Studies  in  Melody,"  p.  86. 


34   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

the  tones  themselves;  it  is  contributed  by  act  of  the  listener. 
When  tone  follows  tone  in  such  a  manner  that  the  hearer  can 
react  adequately  to  each,  when  the  response  to  the  successive 
members  of  the  series  is  not  a  series  of  separate  or  confhcting  acts 
but  rather  in  each  instance  only  a  continuation  or  further  elabora- 
tion of  an  act  already  going  forward,  then  the  tones  are  not  felt 
as  discrete,  separate,  independent,  but  as  related  to  each  other. 
And  when,  finally,  the  series  of  tones  comes  to  such  a  close  that 
what  has  been  a  continuous  act  of  response  is  also  brought  to  a 
definite  completion,  the  balanced  muscular  resolution  gives  rise 
to  the  feeUng  of  finahty,  and  the  series  is  recognized  as  a  unity, 
a  whole,  a  melody."  ^ 

As  I  shall  show  later,  rhythm,  time,  tempo,  tone-color, 
and  intensity  are  common  to  both  speech  and  music.  They 
differ  from  each  other  primarily  in  this:  The  singing  voice 
uses  only  such  tones  as  are  capable  of  combination  into 
scales  and  of  employment  in  melodies;  the  speaking  voice 
does  not  confine  itself  to  any  set  or  sets  of  tones,  but 
employs  all  or  any  of  the  degrees  of  vibration  that  can  be 
produced  within  the  limits  of  its  range. 

For  such  small  degrees  of  pitch  as  are  utilized  by  the 
speaking  voice,  there  is  no  system  of  notation ;  -  nor  can 
one  ever  be  devised.  How  can  it  be  possible  to  represent 
systematically  sounds  that  are  themselves  lacking  in  any 
unifying  principle  such  as  furnishes  the  basis  for  music? 
As  far  as  pitch  is  concerned,  there  is  no  mathematical  re- 
lationship of  one  pitch  to  another.  Hence,  there  can  be 
for  the  speaking  voice  no  possibility  of    combining  tones 

iW.  Van  Dyke  Bingham:   "Studies  in  Melody,"  p.  87. 

*  Dr.  Rush  in  "The  Philosophy  of  the  Human  Voice"  uses  a  system 
that  answers  for  practical  purposes  of  elocution.  John  R.  Scott 
("The  Technique  of  the  Speaking  Voice")  employs  the  Rush  method; 
but  with  neither  man  is  absolute  accuracy  of  pitch  intended.  Consult 
also,  John  Walker  ("The  Melody  of  Speaking")  and  Saran  ("Melodik 
und  Rhythmik  Zueignung  Goethes"). 


PITCH  35 

in  any  such  manner  as  that  made  use  of  by  harmony  in 
music.  In  speech  but  one  voice  can  sound  at  a  time.  The 
moment  two  or  more  voices  begin  to  sound,  unless  they 
are  either  in  unison  or  an  octave  apart,  only  noise  and  con- 
fusion can  result.  Harmony,  as  that  term  is  applied  to 
music,  is  independent  of  either  melody  or  rhythm.  It  is 
the  result  of  a  simultaneous  combination  of  related  tones, 
as  those  tones  are  employed  in  chords.  Since  for  the  speak- 
ing voice  there  is  no  system  of  related  tones,  there  can  be 
no  possibility  of  constructing  chords. 

Of  rhythm,  melody,  and  harmony,  harmony  is  the  last 
phase  to  begin  development  in  the  evolution  of  the  musical 
life  of  a  people;  and  harmony  in  the  strict  sense  of  that 
word  is  possible  to  only  such  musical  systems  as  have  passed 
the  early  stages  of  the  primitive.  In  saying  this,  I  am  per- 
fectly aware  that  the  ancient  Greeks  knew  something  of 
harmony  and  made  use  of  it  in  their  instrumental  music,^ 
that  the  Egyptians  were  acquainted  with  the  diatonic  scale 
probably  as  early  as  3000  b.c.,^  and  that  today  savages 
from  every  quarter  of  the  globe,  especially  the  negroes  of 
Africa,  show  some  skill  in  their  employment  of  harmony.' 
In  fact,  quite  a  number  of  the  negro  tribes  display  a  very 
highly  developed  sense  of  harmony,  and  are  capable  of 
deriving  the  greatest   pleasure  from   melodies  and  harmo- 

1  Rudolph  Westphal:  "Die  Musik  des  Griechischen  Alterthumes," 
p.  24. 

2  Sir  John  Gardner  Wilkinson:   "Ancient  Egyptians,"  vol.  3,  p.  487. 

'  Theodor  Baker:  "tjber  die  Musik  der  Nordamerikanischen 
Wilden." 

Carl  Stumpf:  "Lieder  der  Ballakula  Indianer,"  in  Viertelj.  f. 
Musikw.,  vol.  ii.,  p.  416. 

Hubert  Howe  Bancroft:  "The  Native  Races  of  the  Pacific  States 
of  North  America." 

David  Livingston:  "Missionary  Travels  and  Researches  in  South 
Africa,"  p.  293. 


36   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

nies  far  in  advance  of  anything  with  which  they  have  pre- 
viously been  famihar.^  However  primitive  these  tribes 
may  be  in  other  particulars,  in  their  appreciation  of  music 
they  have  passed  the  primitive  state;  yet  even  though 
some  of  them  make  free  use  of  both  major  and  minor  modes,^ 
there  is  no  such  complexity  of  interweaving  harmonies  as 
modern  European  music  has  developed.  Their  harmonies, 
like  their  melodies,  are  simple,  rudimentary.  Even  at  this, 
their  music  is  far  in  advance  of  that  of  the  Chinese  and  other 
Oriental  peoples,  who  exceed  them  greatly  in  culture,^  and 
immeasurably  in  advance  of  that  of  some  of  the  tribes 
immediately  surrounding  them.  Relatively  speaking,  there- 
fore, any  tribe  or  people  possessing  a  well-defined  scale  and 
a  tolerable  ear  for  harmony  has  risen  above  the  nether 
confines  of  the  musically  primitive;  and  with  them,  as  with 
us,  it  is  possible  to  make  a  distinction  between  their  music 
and  their  verse,  even  where  the  two  art  forms  may  some- 
times overlap. 

The  development  of  music  in  this,  as  in  all  particulars, 
is  in  line  with  general  evolutionary  principles.  From  per- 
fectly indefinite  pitches,  the  tendency  is  toward  pitches  of 
more  and  more  definite  character,  until  in  the  end  only 
those  pitches  which  bear  to  a  tonic  tone  certain  mathe- 
matical ratios  are  employed.     It  is  progress  from   indefi- 

1  John  W.  D.  Moodie:   "Ten  Years  in  South  Africa." 
'^  Friedrich  Ratzel:    "Volkerkunde,"  p.  516. 

Richard  Francis  Burton:  "The  Lake  Region  of  Central  Africa." 

Wilham  Marsden:  "The  History  of  Sumatra,"  p.  196. 
'Michael  Symes:    "Embassy  at  Ava"  in  Pinkert.  Collect.,  vol.  ix., 
p.  485. 

Hector  Berlioz:    "A  travers  chants." 

Ida  Laura  Pfeiffer:   "The  Latest  Travels  of  I.  P.,"  p.  119. 

T.  A.  van  Aalst:  "Chinese  Music." 

Ernst  Faber:  "The  Chinese  Theory  of  Music." 

Billert:    "Japanische  Musik." 


PITCH  37 

niteness  and  incoherence  of  structure  toward  definiteness 
and  coherence.  Speech,  on  the  contrary,  has  made  no  ad- 
vance. Though  the  tendency  in  the  rendering  of  verse 
is  to  use  a  much  more  sustained  tone  than  for  prose,  never- 
theless, even  for  verse,  both  the  prevaihng  tone  and  the 
other  sounds  associated  with  it  are  absolutely  unfixed. 
They  are  related  only  in  so  far  as  one  sound  is  recognized 
as  higher  or  lower  than  another.  The  moment  speech 
sounds  begin  to  take  on  definiteness  and  coherence  of  pitch, 
however,  they  are  moving  toward  the  establishment  of  a 
tonality.  This  tonahty  once  recognized,  it  is  only  a  mat- 
ter of  how  far  the  definition  of  melody  may  be  legiti- 
mately stretched  in  order  to  have  it  include  the  transition 
products. 


CHAPTER  IV 
TONE  QUALITY 

By  far  the  most  difficult  problem  of  acoustics  has  been 
that  presented  in  answer  to  the  question:  To  what  are 
differences  in  tone  quality  —  or  tone-color,  as  it  is  frequently 
called  —  due?  Why  should  any  note  (A4  for  instance) 
when  played  on  the  piano  have  a  different  sound  when 
played  on  the  violin  or  when  sung? 

Many  eminent  physicists,  fascinated  by  the  complexity 
of  the  subject,  have  taxed  their  powers  in  attempting  its 
solution;  yet  for  a  long  time  the  lack  of  agreement  among 
them  was  the  occasion  for  much  doubt  as  to  the  validity 
of  the  results  obtained  by  any  one.  Uniformity  was  ex- 
pected where  uniformity  does  not  exist.  Almost  every 
experimenter  lost  sight  of  a  fact  familiar  to  all  musicians, 
—  namely,  that  no  two  instruments,  even  of  the  same  kind, 
have  exactly  the  same  sound.  This  is  equally  true  of  the 
violin,  the  piano,  or  any  other  instrument;  but  the  differ- 
ence is  particularly  noticeable  in  the  case  of  the  human 
voice.  Who,  if  suddenly  stricken  with  blindness,  would 
fail  to  recognize  by  the  sound  of  their  voices  the  individual 
members  of  his  family?  And  there,  as  a  rule,  the  differ- 
ence is  at  a  minimum.  With  no  two  instruments,  then, 
exactly  alike  in  quality,  the  difficulty  of  investigation  be- 
comes at  once  apparent,  especially  when  it  is  remembered 
how  crude  the  instruments  for  analyzing  tones  must  at 
first  of  necessity  have  been.     Only  within  the  last  few  years 

38 


TONE   QUALITY  39 

have  discoveries  and  inventions  in  other  fields  made  pos- 
sible the  constructing  of  apparatus  sufficiently  sensitive  to 
assure  accurate  results.  Today,  however,  although  many 
problems  are  still  in  need  of  further  elucidation,  certain 
facts,  I  think,  may  be  regarded  as  definitely  established.^ 

It  will  be  remembered  that,  as  a  part  of  Ohm's  Law  of 
Acoustics,  it  was  stated  (1)  that  "every  motion  of  the  air 
which  corresponds  to  a  complex  musical  tone  is  capable 
of  being  analyzed  into  a  sum  of  pendular  vibrations,  and 
[(2)  that^  to  each  simple  vibration  corresponds  a  simple 
tone  which  the  ear  may  hear."  These  separate,  compo- 
nent tones  have  been  designated  as  partials,  the  partial  of 
lowest  frequency  being  the  fundamental.  It  sometimes 
happens  that  one  of  the  upper  partials  is  so  predominant 
as  almost  to  obscure  the  fundamental.  This  Clarence 
Wilson  Hewlett  ^  found  to  be  the  case  for  the  G-string  of 
all  good  violins,  in  the  intensity  of  the  second  partial  (first 
overtone)  being  contained  from  90  to  100  per  cent  of  the 
total  intensity  of  the  string.  In  bells  the  prominence  of 
the  upper  partials  is  still  more  noticeable.  Sometimes 
the  pitch  is  characterized  by  a  subjective  beat-tone,  al- 
though no  actual  physical  tone  of  this  pitch  may  be 
present. 

The  investigations  of  Hermann  von  Helmholtz  led  him  to 
beheve  that  the  quality  of  a  tone  is  entirely  dependent  upon 
the  number  and  relative  strength  of   its   several   partials.^ 

*  The  most  recent,  as  well  as  the  most  authoritative,  popular  book 
on  this  subject  was  published  in  1916  by  Dayton  Clarence  Miller.  He 
has  succeeded  in  photographing  sound  waves  and  in  measuring  the- 
curves  thus  obtained.     I  have  adopted  his  explanation  of  tone  quality.. 

'^  "Analysis  of  Complex  Sound  Waves,"  p.  367  (Johns  Hopkins 
University  dissertation;  also  published  in  Physical  Review,  XXXV.,. 
1892,  pp.  359-372).  See  also  P.  H.  Edwards  in  Physical  Review^ 
XXXII.,  1911,  pp.  23-37. 

^  "Sensations  of  Tone." 


40       THE  FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

Koenig  ^  argued  that  another  factor,  phase,^  might  also 
affect  the  quahty  of  a  sound ;  but  Lindig  ^  showed  that 
this  could  take  place  only  when  one  sound  wave  inter- 
fered with  another.  M,  G.  Lloyd  and  P.  G.  Agnew/  work- 
ing together,  demonstrated  that  differences  of  phase  in 
the  partials  do  not  affect  the  quahty  of  the  tone.  Winkel- 
man,^  Barton,^  Miller,''  and  others  are  also  in  entire  agree- 
ment with  Helmholtz,  so  that  the  weight  of  authority  un- 
doubtedly rests  on  his  side.  Miller,  however,  thinks  that, 
when  beat-tones  are  present,  the  beat-tone  may  have  an 
additional  influence  never  before  fully  appreciated. 

Although  beat-tones  are  purely  subjective,  the  ear  hears 
them  just  as  distinctly  as  if  they  were  real  partials;  and 
their  presence  helps  to  determine  the  tone  quality  of  many 
instruments  and  perhaps  also  of  the  voice.  Beats  and 
beat-tones  I  have  already  defined.  To  this  I  must  add 
an  illustration.  Ce  (frequency  2046)  and  De  (frequency 
2304)  when  sounded  together  produce  a  third  tone  of  the 
pitch  Cs  (frequency  256).  This  latter  tone,  although  hav- 
ing no  physical  existence,  affects  the  ear  just  as  if  it  were 

1  "Quelques  Experiences  d'Acoustique." 

2  Phase  is  the  "particular  value,  especially  at  the  zero  of  time,  of  the 
uniformly  varying  angular  quantity  upon  which  a  simple  harmonic 
motion,  or  a  simple  element  of  a  harmonic  motion,  depends."  —  "Cen- 
tury Dictionary  and  Cyclopedia." 

3  Annalen  der  Physik,  X,  242-269  (1903). 

4  Bulletin  of  the  Bureau  of  Standards,  VI.,  255-263  (1909). 
6"Akustik,"   pp.   268-278,   in   "Handbuch   der   Physik,"   2   Aufl. 

Leipzig,  1909,  Bd.  II.,  "Akustik"  by  F.  Auerbach. 

6  "Text-Book  of  Sound,"  pp.  605-607  (London,  1908). 

^"The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds;"  Physical  Review,  XXVIII., 
151  (1909);  Science,  XXIX.,  471  (1909);  Proceedings  of  the  British 
Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science,  Dundee  (1912),  p.  419; 
Engineering,  London,  XCIV.,  550  (1912);  Proceedings  of  the  Fifth 
International  Congress  of  Mathematicians,  Cambridge  (1912),  II., 
pp.  245-249. 


TONE  QUALITY  41 

a  real  sound.  As  yet  it  is  uncertain  how  much  importance 
to  attribute  to  beat- tones;  still,  they  must  be  taken  into 
consideration.  Although  I  shall  not  mention  them  again, 
it  should  not  be  thought  that  I  am  unaware  of  their  pres- 
ence or  that  I  deliberately  choose  to  pass  them  by.  Too 
little  is  known  about  them  to  justify  the  positing  of  any 
further  statement  than  that  they  are  present  as  a  compo- 
nent in  determining  the  tone  quality  of  some  instruments.^ 

Pitch,  then,  depends  upon  the  number  of  complete  vi- 
brations per  second  of  the  sounding  body;  quahty,  upon 
the  peculiar  kind,  or  form,  of  motion  which  the  body  under- 
goes in  vibrating. 

A  tone  as  it  originates  in  the  sounding  body  is  frequently 
very  faint,  sometimes  even  disagreeable.  The  unsupported 
tone  of  a  tuning  fork  is  of  the  first  type ;  the  squeaky  sounds 
produced  by  the  vibration  of  the  reed  in  the  mouthpiece 
of  the  clarinet  are  of  the  second.  In  order  that  the  inten- 
sity of  the  tone  may  be  increased  and  that  the  vibrations 
may  be  sent  forth  furnished  with  sufficient  briUiance  to 
make  them  pleasing,  it  is  necessary  that  instruments  be 
provided  with  some  mechanical  device  constructed  es- 
pecially for  this  purpose.  The  part  of  the  instrument  in 
which  the  sound  is  produced  is  spoken  of  as  the  generator; 
the  part  which  increases  the  intensity  and  brilliance,  as 
the  resonator.  A  tuning  fork  must  be  mounted  upon  a 
box  if  its  tone  is  to  be  audible  beyond  a  few  feet.  The 
body  of  the  viohn  is  the  chief  source  of  its  resonance.  The 
soundboard  acts  as  resonator  for  the  piano.  The  cavities 
of  the  mouth  and  the  nose  serve  in  the  capacity  of  resona- 
tors for  the  sounds  generated  in  the  larynx.  In  addition 
to  increasing  the  volume  of  a  sound,  resonators  have  still 
another  function.  As  has  been  mentioned  already,  not  all 
the  partials  of  a  given  fundamental  are  pleasing.  These 
iZahm:   "Sound  and  Music,"  pp.  322-340. 


42        THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

disagreeable  sounds  a  well  constructed  resonator  will  sup- 
press, and  at  the  same  time  bring  into  prominence  those 
which  are  agreeable.^  Although  the  resonator  cannot  give 
out  any  tone  not  received  as  the  result  of  vibrations  in  the 
generator,  nevertheless,  it  determines  the  proportions  in 
which  the  fundamental  and  its  component  parts  shall 
reach  the  ear.  The  tone  quality  of  the  pianoforte  is  rich 
and  full,  because  all  partials  except  the  lower,  agreeable 
ones  are  carefully  obliterated,  while  the  latter  are  well 
supported.  The  tone  of  the  tuning  fork  can  never  be 
anything  except  thin,  no  matter  how  the  fork  is  mounted, 
because  the  tone  itself  is  lacking  in  partials.  Its  tone  is 
the  simplest  and  purest  of  all  musical  sounds;  yet  this 
very  simplicity  and  purity  makes  it  monotonous,  and, 
therefore,  unsuited  for  use  as  a  musical  instrument.  To  be 
of  value  musically  a  tone  must  possess  character  and  dis- 
tinction. It  must  have  a  personality  of  its  own.  This 
differentiating  quality  of  sound  is  undeniably  a  question 
of  partials,  or  overtones.  Vowel  quality,  however,  presents 
aspects  both  peculiar  and  difficult.  As  vowels  are  of  the 
utmost  importance  in  all  considerations  of  prosody,  every 
phase  of  the  phenomena  connected  with  them  must  be  in- 
vestigated at  some  length.  First  in  order  must  come  the 
matter  of  vowel  quality. 

^  A  resonating  cavity  may  give  inharmonic  partials  dependent  upon 
the  elasticity  of  its  walls.     See  "Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  181. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS 

Willis  (1829)  was  the  first  to  attempt  an  explanation 
of  vowel  quality.  Since  his  day  no  branch  of  acoustics 
has  been  more  extensively  investigated  than  has  the  subject 
of  vowels;  yet  nowhere  has  there  been  a  greater  disparity 
of  results  obtained.  Although  no  single  opinion  as  to  the 
cause  of  vowel  quality  has  prevailed,  in  general,  two  dis- 
tinct theories  have  developed.  Into  these,  individuals 
have  introduced  such  modifications  as  the  results  of  their 
several  investigations  have  seemed  to  justify. 

The  physicist,  however,  has  not  been  the  only  one  at- 
tracted to  the  vowel  problem.  The  physiologist,  the  vo- 
caHst,  and  the  philologist  have  each  taken  a  hand,  with 
results  so  different  and  so  highly  specialized  that  a  synthesis 
of  their  various  methods  and  findings  seems  well-nigh  im- 
possible, nor  is  one  necessary.  In  fact,  I  believe  it  to  be 
highly  undesirable.  A  great  part  of  the  confusion  both 
in  conception  and  in  terminology  found  in  the  writings 
on  prosody  today  is  due  to  a  mixing  of  these  methods. 
The  terms  long  and  short,  high  and  low,  for  instance,  have 
played  havoc  in  being  bandied  back  and  forth  among 
physiologists  and  vocahsts  and  philologists.  Therefore,  I 
shall  make  no  attempt  to  formulate  a  genetic  or  a  physio- 
logical definition  of  the  term  vowel.  To  do  so  would  be 
like  presenting  the  shape,  size,  material,  and  construction 
of  an  organ  pipe  as  a  definition  of  its  tone.^     Given  these 

•  See  Lloyd's  maps  of  the  mouth  cavity  when  set  for  the  production 
of  different  vowels:  Proc.  Roy.  Soc.  Edin.,  March,  1898. 

43 


44       THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE   OF  VERSE 

factors  the  tone  can  be  produced,  of  course;  but  what 
concerns  us  here  is  the  tone  itself.  What  are  its  con- 
stituents? What  possibilities  do  vowels  present  for  artistic 
purposes?  —  these  are  the  questions  which  I  shall  attempt 
to  answer. 

All  physicists  are  now  agreed  that  a  vowel  consists  of  a 
cord  tone  and  one  or  more  upper  partials  made  prominent 
through  reinforcement  in  the  resonance  chambers  of  the 
buccal  and  nasal  cavities  or  in  the  buccal  alone.  The  divi- 
sion of  opinion  is  with  regard  to  the  relation  of  the  larynx, 
or  cord,  tone  to  the  resonance  tones.  Willis  maintained 
the  mouth  tone  to  be  independent  of  the  cord  tone,  yet  of 
a  fixed,  characteristic  pitch. ^  Wheatstone^  (1837)  and 
Grassmann^  (1854)  extended  this  theory.  Bonders*  (1864) 
found  the  cavity  of  the  mouth  to  be  tuned  to  different 
pitches  for  different  vowels.  The  opinions  of  these  three 
men  gave  rise  to  what  is  called  the  fixed-pitch  theory.  Helm- 
holtz  ^  (1862-1877)  further  enlarged  this  view.  His  theses 
are  (a)  that  the  vowel  sounds  are  different  from  the  sounds 
of  most  musical  instruments  essentially  in  the  fact  that 
the  strength  of  their  partials  depends  not  only  upon  the 
number  of  the  upper  partial,  but  above  all  upon  its  actual 
pitch;  (6)  that,  as  the  voice  rises  or  falls,  the  mouth  must 
also  change  its  tone  in  order  to  be  able  to  extend  its  reso- 
nance to  a  considerable  degree,  the  range  of  accommoda- 
tion extending  in  the  musical  scale  over  as  much  as  a  fifth 
above  and  below  the  tone  of  maximum  resonance.     This 

1  Cambridge  Phil.  Trans.,  III.,  1883,  p.  231,  and  following. 

2  Sir  Charles  Wheatstone:  "Scientific  Papers"  collected  and  pub- 
lished by  the  Physical  Society  of  London  in  1879. 

'  H.  Grassmann:    "Leitfaden  der  Akustik,"  Progr.  Stettin.,  1854. 
*"Zur  Klangfarbe  der    Vocale,"    Annalen  der    Physik   u.  Chemie, 
1864,  CXXIII,  528. 

*  "Sensations  of  Tone,"  translated  by  A.  J.  Ellis. 


THE  QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  45 

view  is  sometimes  called  the  accommodation  theory,  some- 
times the  fixed-resonance  theory.  Willis  believed  no  rela- 
tion to  exist  between  the  mouth  tone  and  the  voice  tone. 
Helmholtz  differed  with  him  in  maintaining  that  the  mouth 
tone  is  one  of  the  partials  of  the  tone  from  the  vocal  cords. 
Pipping  ^  in  1890  agreed  with  Helmholtz  in  the  main;  but 
with  regard  to  the  range  of  reinforcement  he  was  very 
emphatic  in  voicing  a  contrary  opinion.  By  1895,  how- 
ever, Pipping  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  range  of 
accommodation  even  exceeded  the  limits  set  by  Helm- 
holtz. Hermann  ^  (1889),  on  the  contrary,  finds  an  essen- 
tial factor  in  determining  the  quality  of  vowels  to  be  the 
intermittent  or  oscillatory  blowing  of  the  mouth  tone  by 
the  voice.  It  makes  no  difference,  he  said,  whether  the 
resonance  tone  is  the  same  as  any  fraction  of  the  voice 
tone  period  or  not,  though  he  was  confident  that  each  vowel 
has  one  or  two  fixed  tones  whose  pitch  varies  within  nar- 
row limits,  if  at  all.  These  he  called  formants.  The  for- 
mants,  he  objected  to  the  overtone  theory,  lie  too  high 
above  the  larynx  tone  to  be  considered  as  one  of  its  par- 
tials. Miller,  however,  has  found  the  twentieth  and  even 
higher  partials  to  be  of  common  occurrence,  which  vitiates 
Hermann's  opinion  in  no  small  degree.  Hermann  departs 
from  the  fixed-pitch  theory  as  formulated  by  Willis  in  that 
he  adds  the  intermittence  of  the  voice  tone  as  one  of  the 
possible  characteristics  of  vowel  sounds.  The  most  recent 
authoritative  supporter  of  the  fixed-pitch  theory  is  E.  W. 
Scripture,  whose  investigations  led  him  as  early  as  1899  to 
say:  — 

1  "Zur  Klangfarbe  der  geeungenen  Vocale"  (1890). 

"Zur  Lehre  von  den  Vokalklangen  "  (1895). 

2 "  Photographische  Untersuchungen,"  Archiv.  f.  d.  ges.  Physiol. 
iPflilger),  1890,  LXXIV.,  380,  381;  Ibid.,  1894,  LVIIL,  274;  "Weitere 
Untersuchungen  u.  d.  Wesen  der  Vocale,"  Ibid.,  1895,  CXI,  192. 


46        THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

"The  mouth  cavity  with  the  pharynx  and  the  vocal  cords 
may  be  considered  as  a  pipe  with  membranous  reeds.  The 
theory  of  its  action  will  be  similar  to  that  of  an  ordinary  reed 
organ-pipe. 

"Each  vibration  of  the  reed  sends  a  wave  of  condensation  and 
rarefaction  along  the  pipe.  When  the  pipe  is  of  such  a  length 
that  the  wave  is  reflected  back  in  such  a  way  as  to  reinforce  the 
vibration  of  the  reed,  the  resonance  tone  is  a  loud  one.  Thus, 
when  a  properly  adjusted  resonator  is  placed  behind  a  vibrating 
fork,  the  tone  of  the  fork  is  strongly  reinforced.  The  reinforce- 
ment is  also  strong  when  the  resonator  coincides  with  an  overtone 
of  the  reed."  ^ 

Thus  far  he  agrees  with  Helmholtz  and  the  others;  but 
at  this  point  his  divergence  of  opinion  begins: 

But  "Such  a  coincidence,"  says  he,  "between  the  periods  of  the 
pipe  tone  and  the  reed  tone  is  not  necessary.  Each  impulse  from 
the  reed  may  be  considered  as  striking  the  pipe  with  somewhat 
the  nature  of  a  blow,  whereby  the  proper  tone  of  the  pipe  itself 
may  be  aroused  for  an  instant.  The  pipe  may  thus  have  its  own 
pitch  and  be  heard,  no  matter  what  relation  there  may  be  between 
it  and  the  pitch  of  the  reed.  When  the  blow  is  rapidly  repeated, 
both  the  reed  tone  and  the  pipe  tone  will  be  heard."  ^ 

In  opposition  to  the  fixed-pitch  theory,  the  relative-pitch 
theory  has  been  advanced.  The  quality  of  every  musical 
sound,  whether  of  instrument  or  of  voice,  is  determined 
by  a  particular  series  of  partials  accompanying  a  given 
fundamental.  The  pitches  of  the  partials  vary  with  that 
of  the  fundamental  in  such  a  way  that  the  ratios  remain  con- 
stant. Lloyd  ^  (1890)  considers  that  a  vowel  is  character- 
ized by  the  relative  pitches  of  two  or  more  partials. 

1  "Researches  in  Experimental  Phonetics,"  p.  79  (Washington,  1906). 
*E.  W.  Scripture:    "Researches  in  Experimental  Phonetics,"  p.  80. 
'  "Speech  Sounds:   Their  Nature  and  Causation." 
Note  in  Proc.  Brit.  Assoc.  Adv.  Sci.,  1891,  796. 


THE  QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  47 

Auerbach  ^  (1876)  concluded  that  strongly  reinforced 
partials  are  present  in  every  vowel  sound,  but  that  they 
alone  are  insufficient  to  characterize  it.  In  addition,  a 
tone  of  fixed  pitch  is  always  necessary. 

Louis  Bevier,^  writing  in  the  Physical  Review  from  1900 
to  1905,  after  a  most  thorough  analysis  of  vowels,  substan- 
tiates the  fixed-resonance  theory  as  advanced  by  Helm- 
holtz.  A  still  more  recent  writer,  Dayton  Clarence  Miller  ^ 
(1916),  also  is  in  entire  agreement  with  Helmholtz. 

In  proportion  as  instruments  for  the  analysis  of  tone 
have  been  perfected,  very  naturally  better  and  more  reliable 
results  have  been  obtained.  The  photographing  of  sound 
waves  as  conducted  by  Miller  is  the  most  refined  method 
as  yet  devised.  Until  a  still  more  accurate  means  of  analy- 
sis shall  supersede  this,  I  think  we  may  be  justified  in 
assuming  Miller's  explanation  of  vowel  quality  to  be  sub- 
stantially correct. 

Preliminary  to  a  statement  of  Miller's  opinions,  I  wish 
to  quote  several  passages  from  Scripture,  in  the  saneness 
of  which  I  believe  not  only  Miller  but  every  one  of  the  later 
writers  on  vowel  sounds  would  agree : 

A  diphthong  is  not  the  sum  of  two  vowels,  as  Sweet,  Storm,  and 
others^  have  supposed,  but  "an  organic  union  into  a  new  sound. 
.  .  .  Thus,  there  is  no  necessary  pause  or  sudden  change  of  in- 
tensity or  change  in  pitch  or  even  change  in  character.  The 
later  sound  shows  its  influence  in  the  earlier  one,  and  the  earlier 
one  keeps  its  influence  far  into  the  later  one.  That  is  what  would 
be  expected  on  physiological  grounds.  The  speaker  does  not  think 
of  two  sounds  separately  but  of  only  one;    the  execution  of  this 

1  See  Lord  Rayleigh:   "Theory  of  Sound,"  Vol.  XL,  pp.  469-477. 

2  Physical  Review,  X.,  193  (1900);  XIV.,  171,  214  (1902);  XV., 
44,  271  (1902);   XXL,  80  (1905). 

3  "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds"  (Macmillan,  New  York,  1916). 
*  Sweet:   "Primer  of  Phonetics,"  p.  76,  Par.  204. 

Storm:  "Englische  Philologie,"  2  Aufl.,  358,  405,  424. 


48        THE  FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

one  idea  by  two  distinct  processes  would  be  unusual.  The  various 
degrees  of  perfection  of  the  synthesis  of  the  two  elements  would 
correspond  to  the  various  expressive  characters  of  the  resulting 
sound."  ^ 

Josselyn  has  shown  that  a  double  consonant  is  like- 
wise simply  a  single  consonant  strengthened  and  length- 
ened. 

"The  degree  of  synthesis  of  the  two  elements  would  be  lessened 
by  any  great  or  sudden  change  in  intensity,  pitch,  or  character  of 
the  cord  tone  or  the  resonance  tone." 

"Particular  emphasis  must  be  laid  on  the  fact  that  the  tones 
in  a  vowel  are  not  constant  factors  and  that  the  changes  they 
undergo  from  instant  to  instant  are  presumably  highly  important 
in  producing  its  peculiar  character."  ^ 

"A  vowel  is  not  a  fixed  thing  but  a  changing  phenomenon. 
There  is  no  such  thing  as  a  vowel  a  with  a  definite  character  under 
aU  circumstances.  Even  for  the  same  speaker  there  are  continual 
changes  and  variations  in  this  vowel.  For  different  speakers,  for 
different  dialects,  and  for  different  languages  the  changes  become 
so  great  that  the  a  finally  has  Uttle  resemblance  to  the  one  chosen 
as  the  standard.  We  may  say  that  a  large  number  of  our  speech 
sounds  may  be  classed  together  by  a  more  or  less  close  resemblance 
and  may  be  designated  by  the  term  a.  A  similar  statement  would 
hold  good  for  any  speech  sound."  ^ 

Lloyd  is  of  much  the  same  opinion : 

"In  no  language  or  dialect  are  the  sounds  which  pass  current 
for  one  and  the  same  vowel  absolutely  identical.  They  vary 
perceptibly  in  individual  use:  and  hence  ...  a  vowel  is  not  one 
single  definite  sound,  but  a  group  of  more  or  less  closely  resembling 
sounds  which  in  a  given  community  pass  current  for  one  vowel. 
There  seems  to  be  no  practical  limit  to  the  range  of  this  wandering 

1  E.  W.  Scripture:  "Elements  of  Experimental  Phonetics,"  p.  53. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  54.  8  Ibid.,  p.  79. 


THE   QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  49 

so  long  as  the  sounds  employed  do  not  actually  overlap  those  of 
any  other  vowel  which  happens  to  be  used  in  the  same  language."  ^ 

We  are  now  prepared  for  a  summary  of  Miller's  opinions 
as  they  are  contained  in  a  few  important  paragraphs: 

"It  must  be  remembered  that  any  change  in  the  pronunciation 
produces  a  different  vowel,  though  we  may  understand  the  word 
to  be  the  same,  and  that  the  quantitative  results  would  vary  for 
the  shghtest  change  in  intonation  or  inflection.  Since  individual 
pronunciations  vary  greatly,  even  within  the  range  of  one  language, 
there  seems  to  be  no  better  method  of  defining  a  vowel  than  by 
specifying  several  words,  in  each  of  wliich  the  author  gives  the 
vowel  the  same  sound."  ^ 

"Vowels  are  speech  sounds  which  can  be  continuously  intoned, 
separated  from  the  combinations  and  noises  by  which  they  are  made 
into  words."  ' 

"There  is  not  a  fixed  partial  wliich  characterizes  the  vowel, 
neither  is  there  a  single,  fixed  pitch.  The  greater  part  of  the 
energy  of  the  voice  is  in  those  partials  which  fall  within  certain 
Umits,  no  matter  at  what  pitch  the  vowel  is  uttered,  nor  by  what 
quaUty  of  voice;  that  is,  the  vowel  is  characterized  by  a  fixed 
region,  or  regions,  of  resonance  or  reinforcement."  ■* 

"The  mouth  with  its  adjacent  vocal  cavities  is  an  adjustable 
resonator;  but  varying  the  positions  of  the  jaws,  cheeks,  tongue, 
hps,  and  other  parts,  tliis  cavity  can  be  tuned  to  a  large  range  of 
pitches.  When  the  mouth  is  wide  open  and  the  tongue  is  low, 
the  cavity  responds  to  a  single  pitch  of  high  frequency,  and  is  set 
for  the  vowel  father;  .  .  .  when  the  opening  between  the  Ups  is 
small,  00,  the  pitch  is  lowered  as  for  gloom.  The  mouth  cavities 
may  be  adjusted  to  reinforce  two  different  pitches  at  one  time,  as 
has  been  explained  by  Helmholtz;    when  set  for  the  vowel  meet, 

^  "Speech  Sounds:  Their  Nature  and  Causation,"  Phonet.  Stud., 
1890,  III.,  254. 

2  D.  C.  Miller:   "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  217. 
»  Ibid.,  p.  217. 
*  Ibid.,  p.  224. 


50   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

.  .  .  the  cavity  responds  to  two  simple  tones,  one  corresponding 
to  the  back  of  the  oral  cavity,  and  the  other  to  the  channel  be- 
tween the  tongue  and  the  roof  of  the  mouth."  ^ 

"It  is  necessary  that  the  sound  generated  by  the  vocal  cords 
should  be  a  composite  of  at  least  those  partials  which  are  character- 
istic of  the  vowel  to  be  spoken.  The  sounds  of  the  voice  are  nor- 
mally very  rich  in  partials;  in  one  analysis  of  the  vow^el  mat  was 
found  every  partial  from  one  to  twenty  inclusive;  in  another 
analysis  of  the  same  vowel,  there  are  eighteen  partials,  the  highest 
being  number  twenty-four;  in  the  vowel  met,  an  analysis  shows 
sixteen  partials,  the  highest  being  number  twenty-three."  ^ 

"The  process  of  singing  the  vowel  is  probably  as  follows.  The 
jaws,  tongue,  and  hps,  trained  by  lifelong  practice  in  speaking 
and  singing,  are  set  in  the  definite  position  for  the  vowel,  and  the 
mouth  is  then  tuned  unconsciously  to  the  tone  characteristic  of 
that  vowel.  At  the  same  time  the  vocal  cords  of  the  larynx  are 
brought  to  the  tension  giving  it  the  desired  pitch,  automatically 
if  one  is  trained  to  sing  in  tune,  but  usually  as  the  result  of  trial. 
When  the  air  from  the  lungs  passes  through  the  larynx,  a  com- 
posite tone  is  generated,  consisting  of  the  fundamental  of  the  given 
pitch  accompanied  by  a  long  series,  perhaps  twenty  in  niunber,  of 
partials,  usually  of  low  intensity.  The  particular  partials  in  this 
series  which  are  most  nearly  in  unison  with  the  vibrations  proper 
to  the  air  in  the  mouth  cavity,  are  generally  strengthened  by  reso- 
nance, and  the  resultant  effect  is  the  sound  which  the  ear  iden- 
tifies as  the  specified  vowel  sung  at  the  designated  pitch. 

"If,  while  the  mouth  cavity  is  maintained  unchanged  in  posi- 
tion, the  vocal  cords  are  set  successively  to  different  pitches  and 
the  voice  is  produced,  then  one  definite  vowel,  the  same  through- 
out, is  recognized  as  being  sung  at  different  pitches.  In  this  case 
the  region  of  resonance  is  constant,  though  the  pitch  of  the  funda- 
mental may  vary,  as  may  also  the  pitch  and  order  of  the  partials 
which  fall  within  the  region  of  resonance. 

"It  follows  that  a  vowel  cannot  be  enunciated  at  a  pitch  above 
that  of  its  characteristic,  a  condition  which  is  easily  shown  to  be 

1  D.  C.  Miller:   "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  239. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  241. 


THE   QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  51 

true  for  those  vowels  having  a  low-pitched  characteristic,  such  as 
gloom.  Words  which  are  sung  are  often  difficult  to  understand; 
this  may  be  due  in  part  to  the  fact  that  the  tones  of  the  singing 
voice  are  purer  than  those  of  speaking,  that  is,  that  they  have 
fewer  partials;  also,  the  words  must  be  intoned  upon  pitches 
assigned  by  the  composer,  and  the  overtones  may  not  corre- 
spond in  pitch  with  the  characteristics  of  the  vowel;  furthermore, 
singing  tones  are  often  too  high  to  give  the  characteristic,  even 
approximately."  ^ 

Therefore,  in  order  to  secure  a  pure  tone,  singers  often 
sacrifice  the  sound  of  the  vowel.  Sometimes  they  change 
the  word  itself.  Oftener,  however,  they  give  the  vowel 
a  neutral  tint,  so  that,  except  for  the  combination  of  the 
vowel  with  the  other  vowels  and  consonants  of  the  word 
and  for  the  position  of  the  word  in  the  sentence,  the  vowel 
would  be  unrecognizable. 

The  following  table  ^  gives  the  pitches  of  maximum 
intensity  for  several  of   the  vowels.     "The  highest- pitch, 


i 


^      ^      =      = 

te   ^   =   =   = 


W 


moo       mow    maw    ma  mot     mat     met     mate     meet 

poo       poe      paw     pa  pot      pat     pet     pate      peat 

articulate  sound  of  the  human  voice  is  ah  as  in  father," 
says  Miller.  In  fact,  it  is  the  only  vowel  that  can  be  clearly 
characterized  by  all  voices  at  all  pitches.  Moo  and  meet, 
for  instance,  are  difficult  of  vocalization  in  the  upper  ranges 
of  a  soprano  voice;  but  any  vowel  can  be  intoned  freely 
upon  "any  lower  note  of  which  the  characteristic  note  is  a 

1  lUd.,  pp.  241-243.  2  75^.^  p^  260. 


52   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

harmonic,  such  as  notes  an  octave,  a  twelfth,  or  a  fifteenth 
lower  (in  musical  intervals)  than  the  characteristic."  Of 
course,  it  can  be  produced  at  other  pitches  than  these,  but 
less  clearly.  Observe,  too,  that  the  letters  of  the  alphabet 
are  merely  symbols.  A,  for  instance,  is  the  symbol  for 
more  than  half  a  dozen  distinct  vowel  sounds,  the  regions 
of  maximum  intehsity  for  which  vary  greatly,  and  which 
are  in  no  wise  related  one  to  the  other  (fat,  fate,  far,  fall 
ask,  fare,  errant).  Although  dictionaries  use  as  diacriti- 
cal marks  longs  (a,  e,  i)  and  shorts  (a,  e,  i)  and  various  dots 
(d,d,q)  and  curves  (e,w)  over  or  under  the  letters  and  speak 
of  the  sounds  as  the  long  or  the  short,  this  method  of 
nomenclature  is  purely  for  convenience  and  has  nothing 
whatsoever  to  do  with  either  the  actual  nature  of  the  sound 
or  with  the  time  consumed  in  its  pronunciation,  as  I  shall 
show  later. 

If  we  regard  as  vowels  all  sounds  produced  by  vibrations 
of  the  vocal  cords,  in  some  words,  when  sung,  m,  n,  I,  and  ng 
are  just  as  much  vowels  as  a  or  o  or  any  one  of  the  sounds 
to  which  the  term  vowel  has  been  restricted  in  the  past; 
but  in  the  same  words  when  spoken  the  I  or  m  or  n  or  ng 
may  be  so  greatly  reduced  as  to  become  merely  a  conso- 
nant, —  that  is,  a  noise  accompanying  some  vowel.  In 
other  instances,  however,  as  in  heaven,  they  may  in  some 
pronunciations  perform  the  function  of  a  vowel  (heav'n). 
So,  then,  in  vowel  and  consonant  sounds,  as  in  all  phe- 
nomena examined  thus  far,  it  is  noteworthy  that  there  is  no 
clearly  defined  point  of  division.  About  a  large  majority 
of  the  sounds  there  can  be  no  doubt;  but  a  few  of  them 
certainly  lie  on  intermediate  ground  and  must  be  regarded 
sometimes  as  vowels,  sometimes  as  consonants,  according 
to  the  function  which  they  are  performing. 

To  summarize  the  situation:  The  difference  between 
the  tone  quality  of  an  instrument  and  that  of  the  voice  is 


THE  QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  53 

due,  in  the  first  place,  to  a  greater  number  and  a  greater 
prominence  of  the  partials  of  the  voice  tone;  in  the  second, 
to  the  fact  that  for  instruments  it  is  the  relation  of  the  in- 
tensity of  the  various  partials,  and  not  the  pitch  of  the  par- 
tials, that  is  constant,  while  for  the  voice  the  intensity  of  the 
several  partials  will  vary  according  to  their  approximation  in 
pitch  to  the  pitch  of  maximum  intensity  afforded  by  the  cavi- 
ties of  the  mouth  and  of  the  nose  when  acting  as  a  resonator. 

The  tone  effect  produced  by  the  different  vowel  succes- 
sions of  any  artistic  composition  is  exactly  analogous  to 
effects  secured  by  playing  a  melody  on  a  given  instrument 
in  such  a  manner  that  each  tone  is  made  to  have  a  differ- 
ent color.  However,  in  music,  great  care  is  taken  not  to 
vary  the  color  too  rapidly.  Except  in  orchestral  music,  a 
unit  impression  of  quality  is  what  is  commonly  sought.  In 
both  speech  and  song  the  general  voice  quahty  is  constant, 
but  the  specific  vowel  quality  infinitely  varying.  As  A.  J. 
Ellis,  says  "In  singing  they  [the  vowels]  have  to  be  sus- 
tained at  a  steady  pitch  and  with  a  steady  quality,  and 
the  ear  consequently  rapidly  fails  to  recognize  any  particu- 
lar vowel."  ^  In  poetry  the  vowels  are  pronounced  with 
the  greatest  care.  They  are  dehberately  prolonged  beyond 
the  time  lengths  usually  assigned  them  in  conversational 
speech  in  order  to  make  their  tone-color  prominent,  even 
when  assonance,  alliteration,  or  consonance  are  not  in  ques- 
tion, and  to  furnish  a  temporal  basis  for  the  development 
of  rhythm,  though  with  regard  to  each  other  some  vowels 
may  be  relatively  shortened.^ 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  onomatopoeia  is  a  question  of 
considerable  importance  to  prosodists,  before  leaving  tone- 
color,  I  must  direct  attention  to  a  series  of   experiments 

1  "Speech  in  Song,"  p.  30. 

^  Paul  Verrier:  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  metrique  anglaise," 
Vol.  I.,  p.  23,  Par.  37. 


54   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

conducted  by  Dr.  Robert  Chenault  Gilver  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Washington.^  His  purpose  was  twofold,  —  (1)  To 
throw  Hght  upon  the  so-called  tonal  theory  of  poetry,  by 
measuring  the  emotional  value  of  the  sounds  in  poetic 
language  without  reference  to  alliterative  or  grammatical 
devices,  and  (2)  to  discover  what  auditory,  kinaesthetic 
and  organic  sensations  are  aroused  by  the  play  of  vocal 
functions  in  meaningful  as  well  as  meaningless  collocations 
of  the  elements  of  language."  After  eight  years  of  work, 
during  which  time  he  examined  540,000  sounds  and  meas- 
ured nearly  300,000  bits  of  data  involving  more  than  a 
million  computations,  he  could  offer  nothing  more  definite 
than  this: — (1)  Though  strictly  speaking  the  terms  long 
and  short  are  equivocal,  the  so-called  short  vowels  and 
the  explosive  consonants  are  provocative  of  more  motor 
arousal  than  the  long  vowels  and  the  liquids;  (2)  In  answer 
to  the  question,  if  this  or  that  number  of  sounds  will 
produce  this  or  that  effect,  the  reply  can  be  made  in  the 
affirmative  only  after  taking  into  consideration  the  number 
and  the  arrangement  of  the  sounds.  "Only  in  the  longer 
passages  does  there  seem  to  be  a  trend  toward  a  tonal  cal- 
culus. And  here,  the  surprising  thing  is  that  a  very  small 
number  of  explosive  sounds  in  one  passage  over  those  in 
another  produced  a  motor  difference  greater  than  that  de- 
ducible  from  the  single  effects  of  the  elements  involved;" 
(3)  "The  tonal  pattern  of  poetry  is  quite  more  definite 
than  hitherto  suspected,  and  a  poet  may  be  known  by  his 
overtones  as  well  as  by  his  subject-matter  and  stanza  form. 
...  It  is  not  an  impossible  assumption  that  poetry  as  well 
as  other  forms  of  art  may  possess  in  each  of  their  leading 
features,  form  and  content,  a  sufficiency  of  emotional  wealth 

1  "The  Psycho-physiological  Effect  of  the  Elements  of  Speech  in 
Relation  to  Poetry,"  Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  XIX.,  No.  2, 
April,  1915,  Psychological  Review  Company,  Lancaster,  Pa. 


THE  QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  55 

to  be  considered  each  alone  as  able  to  arouse  the  aesthetic 
consciousness  to  the  full.  The  union  of  the  two  may  add 
nothing  but  unity."  ^ 

To  this  let  me  add  an  account  of  a  few  experiments  of 
my  own,  which,  though  rough  in  the  extreme,  nevertheless, 
appear  to  me  to  yield  something  of  significance.  I  read 
before  a  group  of  college  students  unacquainted  with  Ger- 
man a  number  of  poems  in  that  language.  Each  poem  was 
read  several  times.  Regardless  of  the  sense,  one  reading 
I  would  make  very  quiet  and  pastoral;  and  the  subjects 
were  told  to  write  down  their  impression  of  its  content. 
The  next  reading  would  be  light  and  merry;  the  third, 
tragic  and  somber.  I  found  that  they  took  their  cue  en- 
tirely from  the  interpretation  which  I  gave  the  words,  and 
that  at  no  time  did  there  seem  to  them  to  be  anything  in- 
congruous between  the  words  themselves  and  the  manner 
of  my  reading  them,  although  I  had  been  particularly  care- 
ful to  select  only  poems  generally  cited  as  highly  onomat- 
opoetic.  Such  an  example  in  English  is  offered  by  Poe's 
"The  Bells."  This  poem  was  undoubtedly  composed  with 
special  reference  to  fitting  the  sound  to  the  sense;  yet  I 
have  my  doubts  about  the  power  of  the  sounds  themselves 
to  arouse  any  definite  conception  when  disassociated  from 
the  sense.  Gold  and  ghoul  are  certainly  not  widely  dif- 
ferent in  sound,  though  in  the  poem  how  different  their 
effect!  Then,  too,  the  word  bells  must  certainly  be  taken 
as  a  factor  common  to  every  stanza.  Sargent  ^  thinks 
that  its  repetition  is  almost  fatal;  and  Tolman  ^  deliberately 
omits  it  in  making  up  his  percentages  of  the  vowel  sounds 

1  Gilver:  "The  Psycho-physiological  Effect  of  the  Elements  of 
Speech  in  Poetry,"  pp.  124-130. 

^  In  "Cyclopedia  British  and  American  Poetry." 

'  "Laws  of  Tone-Color  in  the  English  Language,"  Andover  Review, 
Vol.  VII.,  March.,  1887,  p.  331. 


56   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

in  that  poem.  Yet  I  have  heard  it  so  read  that  bells  clanged 
or  boomed  or  tinkled  or  shuddered  in  most  perfect  keep- 
ing with  the  several  stanzas.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  word 
has  no  tonal  value  whatsoever  aside  from  that  imposed 
upon  it  by  the  reader.  Of  itself  it  suggests  nothing.  It 
can  be  made  to  suggest  anything. 

Of  course,  some  words  are  agreeable,  some  disagreeable; 
some  easy  to  pronounce,  some  exceedingly  difficult.^  What 
vowel  and  consonant  combinations  offer  is  the  opportunity 
to  build  from  them  more  or  less  pleasing  successions  or 
patterns.  The  pleasant  combinations  are  regarded  as 
suggesting  quiet,  love,  beauty,  and  all  high  emotions; 
the  disagreeable,  as  suggesting  strife,  hate,  tumult,  base- 
ness.2  Yet,  even  in  artistic  verse,  these  various  sounds 
are  so  intermixed  that  only  in  rare  instances  does  any  one 
element  predominate.  A  number  of  words  are  undoubtedly 
imitations  of  sounds  in  nature;^  but  to  me  it  seems  that 
their  importance  in  language  has  been  overestimated. 
Tolman,  however,  is  quite  near  the  truth  in  claiming  that: 
"Particular  ideas  and  feelings  have  analogues  in  sound 
which  best  express  them,  and  that  this  is  felt  to  be  true  in 
the  present  time  by  the  aesthetic  sense,  the  language  con- 
sciousness, of  the  cultivated  users  of  English.  In  this 
way  I  believe  in  sound-metaphor."  *  Of  course,  it  must 
never  be  forgotten  that  this  language  consciousness  is  ac- 
quired through  the  association  of  ideas  with  words.     For 

1  Louise  Roblee  and  M.  F.  Washburn:  " Affarent  Values  in  Articu- 
late Sounds,"  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  1912. 

Gilver:  "The  Psycho-physiological  Effect,"  etc.,  pp.  28-29,  35-36. 

2  Gilver:   Ibid.,  p.  35. 

*  Heyse:    "System  der  Sprachwissenschaft." 

*  Tolman:  "The  Laws  of  Tone-Color  in  the  English  Language," 
p.  326. 

!  H  See  also  Verrier:  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  m6trique  anglaise," 
Vol.  L.  p.  118,  Par.  150,  and  following. 


THE   QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  57 

instance,  the  noun  rush,  meaning  a  kind  of  reed,  does  not 
awaken  at  all  the  same  emotional  response  as  the  verb  to 
rush,  though  their  tone-color  is  identical. 

The  correct  statement  of  the  case  seems  to  me  to  be  this : — 
Certain  sounds  set  to  certain  rhythms  will  produce  given  effects 
provided  (and  here  the  provision  is  of  the  utmost  importance) 
other  elements  are  introduced  to  suggest  to  the  imagination 
something  far  more  concrete  than  that  suggested  by  the  sounds 
themselves.  Speed  of  utterance  combined  with  pitch  and 
intensity  of  voice  are  most  important  factors;  but  they^ 
too,  are  subjectively  determined.  Behind  them  must  be 
some  idea  with  which  they,  as  well  as  the  syllables,  must 
be  infused.  Musicians  are  very  careful  to  state  at  the 
beginning  of  their  compositions  at  what  tempo  and  with 
what  intensity  the  notes  are  to  be  rendered;  and  there 
is  never  the  slightest  doubt  as  to  the  tone-color  to  be 
employed.  Yet  what  could  be  more  general  or  more 
indefinite  than  the  emotions  aroused  in  hearing  a  given  com- 
position? "Music,"  says  Harry  Porter  Weld  after  a  most 
thorough  investigation,  "is  powerless  to  portray  a  definite 
picture  in  any  uniform  or  universal  sense,  or  to  convey  the 
same  group  of  imagery  into  the  minds  of  each  of  its  audi- 
tors." ^  It  is  this  to  you  and  that  to  me  unless  we  are  given 
a  hint  as  to  what  channels  the  imagination  is  to  follow. 
Here  both  prose  and  verse  have  a  decided  advantage  over 
pure  music.  Words  are  associated  with  ideas.  They 
impose  their  moods  upon  the  sounds  of  which  they  are 
built  up;  but  the  ideas  to  be  expressed  determine  the  choice 

1  "An  Experimental  Study  of  Musical  EnjojTnent,"  American- 
Journal  of  Psychology,  XXIIL,  April,  1912,  p.  300. 

For  an  interesting  dissenting  opinion  see  "Music  and  Emotion"  by 
Dr.  Albert  Balz  {Journal  of  Philosophy,  Psychology  and  ScientiJiG- 
Methods,  XL,  No.  9,  April  23,  1914).  I  believe  that,  if  Dr.  Balz  had 
extended  his  inquiry  to  the  music  of  all  lands  through  many  ages,  he 
might  have  reached  a  far  different  conclusion. 


58        THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

of  words,  the  rhythm,  the  tempo,  the  intensity,  and  the 
pitch.  Inversely,  given  the  word  (that  is,  the  tone-color) 
uttered  in  the  same  rhythm  at  the  same  speed  and  with 
the  same  intensity  and  pitch,  a  similar  emotional  state 
can  be  reinduced.  The  definiteness  of  the  emotional  state, 
however,  will  depend  largely  upon  the  amount  of  prompt- 
ing received  from  the  words.  Almost  every  poet  displays 
a  marked  preference  for  certain  sounds.  Poe  reveled  in 
00,  Byron  in  o,  Shelley  in  e  and  i;  yet  all  were  able  to  pro- 
duce somewhat  similar  effects,  though  rarely  by  the  same 
means.  In  like  manner  poets  are  prone  to  use  characteris- 
tic rhythms  and  stanzaic  forms;  but  how  far  any  one  word, 
any  one  rhythm,  or  any  one  form  is  preeminently  fitted  to 
express  a  particular  idea  or  emotion  is  certainly  worth 
pondering.  I  rather  suspect  that  ghost,  Gheist,  and  spectre 
are  equally  eery,  no  matter  in  what  language  they  appear. 
To  my  mind,  such  fitness  of  material  is  largely  a  matter  of 
association,  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  skill  on  the  part  of 
the  user,  on  the  other.  Where  A,  B,  C,  and  D  may  fail  with 
certain  materials  to  produce  a  satisfactory  work  of  art, 
E  may  erect  for  himself  therefrom  an  arch  of  triumph. 
This  same  truth  holds  good  in  music.  The  possibilities  of 
orchestration  had  been  thought  to  be  exhausted  long  before 
Wagner  came;  yet  Tschaikowsky  and  an  entirely  new  school 
of  Russians  have  arisen  since.  I  had  always  regarded  the 
flute  as  an  instrument  of  rather  limited  capacity  until  I 
heard  a  great  artist  play  it.  Now  I  know  that  it  possesses 
both  fire  and  passion  as  well  as  mellowness  and  airy  grace. 
About  such  matters,  then,  I  feel  it  wiser  not  to  dogmatize. 
It  seems  is  the  most  that  can  be  affirmed;  for  no  sooner 
is  a  law  laid  down  than  whisk!  and  some  wizard  has  ac- 
complished the  impossible.  Thereafter  it  is  thought  that 
only  by  this  means  can  the  desired  end  be  reached,  —  that 
is,  until  some  new  genius  arrives  to  show  us  otherwise. 


THE  QUALITY  OF  VOWEL  SOUNDS  59 

As  was  found  to  be  the  case  with  melody  and  harmony, 
in  combinations  of  vowels  and  consonants  we  accept  as 
agreeable  that  to  which  we  are  accustomed,  that  which  we 
can  in  a  measure  anticipate.  Therein  lies  the  charm  of 
rhyme,  alliteration,  and  assonance.  A  pattern  in  tone- 
color  is  set  up.  Expectation  is  awakened.  With  its  ful- 
fillment muscular  tension  is  released;  and  a  feeling  of 
satisfaction  ensues.  In  general,  our  judgment  of  tone- 
color  is  not  of  this  type,  but  vague,  indefinite,  illusive. 
Therefore,  when  into  this  moving  spectrum  of  sound  some 
sound  that  can  be  anticipated  appears,  a  more  intense  and 
concrete  pleasure  is  at  once  experienced.  The  Law  of  the 
Return  has  been  fulfilled.  It  is  not  necessary,  however, 
from  an  artistic  point  of  view  that  the  emotions  or  the 
mental  images  of  the  creator  should  coincide  with  those 
of  his  auditors,  since  in  the  cultivation  and  exercise  of  both 
music  and  verse  one's  intention  "is  not  so  much  to  make 
himself  intelligible  as  to  inspire  his  fellow-men."  ^  Toward 
this  end  vowel  color  is  a  factor  common  to  prose,  verse, 
and  music,  though  in  music,  and  particularly  in  verse, 
there  is  a  deliberate  attempt  to  make  of  it  a  definite  source 
of  inspiration.  It  is  brought  under  control  by  the  rhyth- 
mic impulse;  and,  when  it  appears  in  its  most  studied  form 
(as  alliteration,  as  assonance,  or  as  rhyme),  it  has  the  double 
function  not  only  of  providing  an  agreeable  succession  of 
sounds  but  also  of  supplying  an  auxiliary  to  rhythm.  There- 
fore, further  consideration  of  vowel  color  must  be  deferred 
until  it  can  be  taken  up  again  in  its  proper  place  under  the 
latter  heading. 

To  this  point  the  important  facts  with  reference  to  vowels 
are  these: —  (1)  Although  some  vowels  impress  the  ear  as 
being  high,  others  as  low,  and  still  others  as  medium,^  in 

1   Richard  Wallaschek:   "Primitive  Music,"  p.  258. 
*   Gilver:  "The  Psycho-physiological  Effect,  etc.,"  p.  20. 


60   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

reality  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  high  or  low  or  medium 
vowel.  All  tone  quaHty  results  from  the  presence  of  par- 
tial s.  The  tone  quality  of  vowels  has  this  peculiarity, 
—  that  for  each  vowel  there  is  a  certain  range  of  pitch  within 
the  limits  of  which  its  characteristic  upper  partials  must 
fall  in  order  that  the  vowel  may  be  produced.  Regard- 
less of  actual  pitch,  a  thin  sound  often  impresses  the  ear 
as  being  high,  a  rich  sound  as  being  low.  An  abundance 
of  brilliant  partials  makes  for  richness;  their  absence,  for 
an  opposite  effect.  (2)  It  can  not  be  maintained  that  vowels 
and  consonants  in  and  of  themselves  can  induce  either 
separately  or  in  combination  any  certain  emotional  state, 
though,  when  aided  by  pitch,  intensity,  rhythm,  and  tempo, 
and  especially  when  infused  with  the  suggestive  power  of 
language,  they  may  become  most  potent  in  arousing  a 
general  emotional  impression.  (3)  Vowel  quality  is  com- 
mon to  prose,  verse,  and  vocal  music;  but  it  finds  its  most 
definite  artistic  value  as  a  phenomenon  of  verse. 


CHAPTER  VI 
INTENSITY 

Intensity  in  physics  and  mechanics  is  defined  by  the  "Cen- 
tury Dictionary  and  Cyclopedia"  as  the  amount  or  degree 
of  energy  with  which  a  force  operates  or  a  cause  acts;  effect- 
iveness, as  estimated  by  the  result;  the  magnitude  of  a  force, 
measured  in  appropriate  units.  Within  the  range  of  pitch 
used  by  speech  and  the  more  common  sounds  of  music, 
intensity  and  degree  of  energy  may  be  regarded  as  practically 
synonymous  terms.  Therefore,  the  intensity,  or  loudness, 
of  a  sound  may  be  thought  of  as  the  degree  of  energy  with 
which  the  sound  operates.  We  have  seen  that  the  pitch  of  a 
sound  is  the  result  of  speed  of  molecular  vibration;  and 
color,  of  the  form  of  molecular  vibration.  The  amplitude  of 
the  vibration  determines  its  loudness.  Let  me  illustrate. 
If  a  viohn  string  be  plucked  with  the  fingers,  it  can  be  seen 
to  swing  back  and  forth  like  a  pendulum.  If  the  string 
swings  through  a  small  arc,  the  sound  is  soft;  if  through  a 
large  arc,  the  sound  is  loud.  Amplitude,  then,  "is  the  range 
on  one  side  or  the  other  from  the  middle  point  of  the  motion, 
therefore  it  is  half  the  extreme  range  of  vibration."  ^  The 
energy  of  a  sound  "varies  as  the  square  of  the  amplitude, 
the  frequency  remaining  constant;  when  both  amplitude 
and  frequency  vary,  the  intensity  varies  as  the  square  of 
the  product  of  amplitude  and  frequency."  ^  Although 
intensity  of  tone  can  be  thus  reduced  to  a  formula,  there 
is  still  no  appropriate  unit  of  measurement.     For  pitch  of 

»  D.  C.  Miller:   "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  7. 
61 


62   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

tone  a  definite  standard  of  tone  can  be  agreed  upon,  and 
the  other  tones  can  be  measured  with  reference  to  it.  But 
not  so  with  intensity.  The  nearest  approach  to  a  stand- 
ard is  at  best  only  a  very  general  thing.  Musicians  write 
across  their  scores  soft,  loud,  moderately  loud,  etc.;  but  these 
directions  furnish  no  clue  to  how  soft  or  how  loud.  Were 
speech  not  governed  by  habit  of  utterance,  chaos  would 
reign  supreme.  Intellectual  and  emotional  considerations, 
however,  determine  the  amount  of  energy  that  shall  be 
put  into  any  sentence,  clause,  phrase,  word,  or  syllable, 
so  that  for  a  given  art  product  the  degree  of  energy  expended 
is  determined  by  the  content  of  the  words  themselves.  It 
is  no  longer  a  dijB5cult  matter  for  physicists  to  plot  the  in- 
tensity of  tones  or  to  determine  the  relative  intensity  of  a 
given  tone  at  a  particular  instant  of  time.^  Still,  this  is 
very  different  from  establishing  a  standard  of  tone  inten- 
sity or  from  saying  that  the  ear  makes  other  than  vague, 
general  judgments  as  to  the  intensity  of  any  sound  or  group 
of  sounds  presented  to  it.  The  ear  of  every  hearer  is  in- 
dividual in  its  degree  of  sensitivity.  Furthermore,  certain 
people  are  peculiarly  sensitive  to  sounds  of  different  pitches 
and  various  tone-colors.  There  can  be  no  unit  of  inten- 
sity, because  we  are  entirely  dependent  upon  subjective 
factors  for  the  determination  of  the  degree  of  this  partic- 
ular class  of  sensations,-  and  these  sensations  are  too 
fluctuating  to  be  coordinated. 

Nevertheless,  intensity  remains  one  of  the  most  important 
structural  factors  in  tonal  art.     For  prose,  verse,  and  music, 

1  P.  Bourdon:   " L'application  de  la  methode  gr^phique  a  I'^tude  de 
I'intensite  de  la  voix,"  L'Anee  Psychologique,  1907. 

D.  C.  Miller:  "Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  pp.  92-141. 

2  Winkelmann:    "Akustik,"  pp.  228-254. 

A.  G.  Webster:  Physical  Review,  1903,  16,  248. 

D.  C.  Miller:   "The  Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  p.  53. 


INTENSITY  63 

though  each  may  employ  it  within  the  conventions  pecul- 
iar to  the  particular  form,  intensity  is  essential.  General 
effects  of  diminuendo  and  crescendo,  of  sustained  loud  and 
soft,  of  marked  and  abrupt  changes  from  loud  to  soft,  and 
vice  versa  are  common  to  all  three;  yet,  because  of  their 
variableness  and  of  their  incapacity  for  standardization, 
they  call  for  no  further  comment.  Though  having  impor- 
tant ancillary  functions,  they  are  not  essentials.  They 
give  variety;  they  help  to  show  degree  of  emotion  as  well 
as  to  induce  it;  but  they  are  matters  of  individual  inter- 
pretation and  nothing  more.  The  manner  in  which  they 
are  used  may  indicate  whether  the  interpreter  is  an  artist 
or  a  tyro.  Yet  for  all  that,  they  simply  do  not  enter  into 
the  scheme  of  the  prose  writer  or  of  the  poet.  Even  the 
composer  might  fail  to  indicate  them  on  his  score  without 
material  damage  either  to  his  reputation  or  to  our  under- 
standing of  his  work.  In  these  matters  almost  every  per- 
former, every  singer,  every  conductor  allows  himself  the 
utmost  latitude.  Here  he  feels  that  he  has  a  right  to  ex- 
press his  own  conception  of  the  composer's  intention,  some- 
times even  in  defiance  of  the  latter's  explicit  instructions. 
In  no  other  particular  (excepting,  of  course,  all  considera- 
tions of  tempo)  would  the  interpreter  feel  that  he  had  an 
equally  free  hand.  Certainly  he  would  never  dare  to 
change  the  time  or  the  tonal  structure  in  any  way,  no  more 
than  a  reader  could  with  impunity  alter  the  position  of  a 
word  or  the  tone-color  of  a  rhyme. 

The  second  function  of  intensity,  —  its  use  as  accent, 
—  can  not  be  thus  summarily  dismissed,  however.  While 
I  am  not  prepared  to  say  that  tonal  art  can  not  exist  with- 
out it,  certainly  one  school  of  English  prosodists  has  taken 
the  position  that  it  is  the  sine  qua  non  of  English  verse. 
Respect  for  the  opinion  of  Edwin  Guest  and  his  followers 
as  well  as  the  inherent  importance  of  the  subject    itself 


64   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

demands  that  I  enter  at  some  length  into  its  discussion. 
First,  however,  it  is  necessary  to  direct  attention  to  general 
considerations  of  time  and  time  relationships,  and  with 
this  preparation  to  pass  immediately  to  the  discussion  of 
accent  as  one  of  the  determining  factors  of  rhythm.  In  the 
meanwhile,  what  should  be  kept  in  mind  is  this:  Our  judg- 
ments of  intensity  are  relative.  A  sound,  which,  when  asso- 
ciated with  some  other  sound  or  group  of  sounds,  may  become 
relatively  prominent,  may  in  fact  possess  very  little  intensity. 
It  is  judged  to  he  loud  because  it  is  louder  than  another  sound 
of  group  of  sounds,  though  perhaps  in  reality  it  may  be  no 
louder  than  the  others,  hut  merely  appear  to  he  so  because  of 
some  peculiar  conditions  of  pitch  or  of  tone-color  to  which  the 
hearer  is  susceptible.  The  length  of  duration  also  influences 
our  judgments  of  intensity.  So  much  in  passing.  Each 
of  these  phases  of  the  subject  will  be  proportionately  de- 
veloped in  due  season. 


CHAPTER  VII 

GENETIC   ASPECTS   OF   RHYTHM 

To  surplus  of  animal  vigor  is  probably  traceable  the 
origin  of  the  temporal  arts.^  Among  certain  of  the  anthro- 
poid apes  and  even  among  birds,^  this  surplus  of  vigor  finds 
vent  in  muscular  movements  resembling  those  of  the  com- 
munal dances  of  primitive  peoples.  Of  course.,  these  move- 
ments are  entirely  lacking  in  coordination,  even  when  they 
are  practised  by  gregarious  animals  and  birds;  but  so,  too, 
are  the  dances  of  the  lowest  types  of  savages.  In  some 
instances  these  animal  dances  are  even  accompanied  by 
rhythmical  noises  not  unlike  the  beating  of  instruments  of 
percussion.  Bird  song,  however  (and  to  this  I  have  not 
been  referring),  is  as  lacking  in  definiteness  of  rhythm  as  it 
is  deficient  in  systematization  of  pitch;  and  herein  lies  the 
distinction  between  music  and  mere  vocal  utterance. 

"True  music,"  says  Wallaschek,'  "requires  a  degree  of  obser- 
vation, an  intention  and  a  participation  of  the  intellect,  and  not 
only  a  momentary  reflex  of  feeling;  it  requires  the  form  of  time- 
ordered  perception  which  is  lacking  in  the  animal  and  so  strongly 
pronounced   in   the   choral   dance-music   of   primitive   men.    An 

^  Herbert  Spencer:   "On  the  Origin  and  Function  of  Music." 

^  Charles  Darwin:   "Descent  of  Man,"  2d  ed.,  pp.  68-74. 

Guessfeldt,  Falkenstein,  Pechuel-Loesche:  "Die  Loango  Expedi- 
tion," p.  152. 

C.  Lloyd  Morgan:   "Animal  Sketches,"  p.  171. 

Richard  Wallaschek:  "Primitive  Music."  In  a  note  on  page  241 
both  Du  Chaillu  and  Koppenfels  are  said  to  confirm  this  in  reference  to 
the  gorilla. 

3  Mind,  New  Series,  Vol.  IV.,  No.  13,  p.  35. 

65 


66   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

individual  vocal  reflex  arises  and  vanishes  with  the  stimulus  of 
the  moment,  while  singing  in  concert  requires  a  definite  purpose, 
a  definite  arrangement  of  utterances,  which  are  to  be  intentionally 
worked  out,  practised  and  preserved  in  memory.  In  this  unsettled 
condition  song  would  become  monotonous,  ineffective,  and  there- 
fore calls  for  variety.  Variety  in  the  face  of  tradition  means 
progress,  development,  and  thus  choral  music  alone  affords  the 
starting  point  for  our  art;  in  its  intrinsic  character  hes  the  germ 
of  music.  .  .  .  Men  dance  in  a  unison  and  with  a  symmetry  which 
are  wanting  in  animals'  dances,  and  this  deficiency  is  due  to  a 
mental  cause  which  betrays  —  if  I  am  not  mistaken  —  the  most 
serious  difference  between  men's  and  animals'  intelligence  on 
record." 

It  seems,  therefore,  that  the  desire  to  expend  surplus 
energy  in  rhythmical  movements  of  the  body  is  common  to 
man  as  well  as  to  many  animals  related  to  the  human  family 
in  only  the  remotest  degree.  The  habit  of  dancing  is  uni- 
versal among  both  civilized  and  uncivilized  peoples.  Wher- 
ever the  communal  instinct  prevails  and  there  is  leisure 
in  which  to  give  expression  to  the  desire  for  play,  there 
dancing  is  the  most  frequent  of  pastimes.^  The  degree 
of  coordination  of  movement  among  the  dancers  is  variable. 
Sometimes  it  is  almost  negligible.  Sometimes  it  is  very 
highly  developed.  Invariably,  however,  the  dance  is  ac- 
companied by  some  sound  to  mark  the  rhythm,  whether 
the  sound  be  produced  by  the  beating  of  drums,  the  clap- 
ping of  hands,  or  the  human  voice.^     Not  infrequently  the 

^  Except,  of  course,  where  Christianity  has  discouraged  dancing. 

^  Richard  Lander:  "Records  of  Captain  Clapperton's  Last  Ex- 
pedition to  Africa,"  I.,  p.  293,  p.  15L 

Joseph  Corry:  "Observations  upon  the  Windward  Coast  of  Africa," 
p.   153. 

Henry  Foster:  " Narrative  of  a  Voyage  to  the  South  Atlantic  Ocean," 
pp.  275-276. 

Wood,  Livingston,  Grant,  Mauch,  Baker,  Ratzel,  Violloteau,  Barker 


GENETIC  ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  67 

dancers  stamp,  play  some  instrument,  and  either  sing  or 
recite,  —  all  at  one  and  the  same  time. 

To  my  mind  Wallaschek  presents  the  most  plausible 
theory  by  which  to  account  for  the  origin  of  both  music 
and  verse  in  finding  their  common  source  in  the  accom- 
paniment to  the  dance. ^  Very  early  they  may  become 
dissociated  from  it;  but  they  are  never  completely  and 
irrevocably  separated.  Even  when  they  exist  independent 
of  each  other,  however,  they  are  still  of  common  occur- 
rence together. 

As  I  have  already  stated,  wherever  there  arises  the  neces- 
sity for  the  expression  of  communal  feeling,  whether  in 
war,  work,  mourning,  joy,  religious  rite,  or  as  a  mere  pas- 
time, some  unifying  principle  must  be  found.  Otherwise 
there  could  be  only  the  chaos  of  individual  emotion.  For 
the  dance,  music,  verse,  and,  to  a  limited  extent,  for  prose, 
this  principle  is  furnished  by  rhythm.  The  muscles,  sur- 
charged with  energy,  find  relief  from  their  tension  by  means 
of  rhythmical  movements. 

"The  first  stimulus  is  the  muscular  sense,  and  the  sense  of  hear- 
ing only  comes  into  action  later  as  an  additional  help  in  getting 
a  greater  number  and  superior  quality  of  sensational  impressions 
which  through  their  qualitative  difference  and  greater  substantial 
richness  might  facilitate  the  course  of  the  cortical  process.  .  .  . 
A  long  time  is  needed  before  the  sense  of  hearing  can  take  a  part 

and  Berthelot,  B.  Smith,  Eyre,  Beechey,  Oldfield,  Cook,  A.  B.  Meyer, 

and  as  many  others  are  cited  by  Wallaschek  in  his  chapter  on  Dance 

and  Music  in  "Primitive  Music"   (p.   187)  in  corroboration  of  this 

statement. 

1  Both  Andrian  and  Verrier  deny  this  origin  to  verse :  — 

F.  von  Andrian:    "Some  Results  of   Modern  Ethnology,"   Corre- 

spondenzblatt  der  deutschen  Gesellschaft  fiir  Anthropologie,  Ethnologic, 

und  Urgeschichte,  1894,  No.  8,  p.  71. 

Paul  Verrier:  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  metrique  anglaise,"  III., 

p.  71  (Paris,  1909-1910). 


68       THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

of  equal  importance  with  the  common  action  based  on  the  muscu- 
lar sense,  and  yet  a  long  time  before  it  becomes  the  more  and 
ultimately  only  important  sense.  The  whole  structure  of  primi- 
tive music  shows  this:  an  unsettled  melody,  an  uncertain  and  con- 
stantly varying  intonation,  a  perpetual  fluctuation  of  pitch,  and 
contrasting  this  with  the  strict  and  ever-prevaiUng  rhythm,  with 
the  precision  and  marvelously  exact  movements  of  numberless 
performers  —  we  see  where  the  chief  point  lies."  ^ 

In  a  state  of  civilization  where  violence  of  movement  is 
not  looked  upon  with  favor,  a  gradual  suppression  takes 
place,  until,  finally,  in  music,  in  verse,  and  in  rhythmical 
prose,  muscular  contortions  become  entirely  negligible, 
even  though  muscular  tension  has  by  no  means  ceased  to 
exist.  The  dance,  too,  is  greatly  modified  and  refined. 
For  all  four  there  is  the  process  of  development  from  poorly 
marked  rhythm  in  communal  expression  to  a  greater  and 
greater  degree  of  exactness.  This  exactness  becomes  so 
strongly  rooted  in  the  feelings  of  certain  individuals  that 
they  are  able  to  develop  and  to  maintain  rhythms  when 
acting  quite  independently  of  the  group. 

Just  here  it  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  rhythmical 
expenditure  of  surplus  energy  is  not  instinctive,  but  ac- 
quired. Like  our  scales  and  our  melodies,  it,  too,  comes 
to  us  as  a  part  of  our  social  inheritance.  P.  F.  Swindle  is 
quite  right  in  saying :  — 

"All  experimental  evidence  seems  to  point  to  the  conclusion 
that  rhythm  is  acquired  by  each  individual,  and  that  it  is  not  in- 
herited. Biological  conditions,  —  for  example,  the  anatomical 
fact  that  we  are  two-handed  and  two-footed  and  generally  two- 
sided,  not  three-cornered  nor  star-fish-like  beings,  —  are  favor- 
able for  the  development  of  those  rhythms  which  can  usually  be 
considered  to  be  instinctive,  while  the  other  rhjrthms  can  be  ac- 
quired only  under  special,  somewhat  artificial  conditions.  The 
best  means  for  developing  rhythm  is  that  which  approaches  our 

1  R.  Wallaschek:  Mind,  New  Series,  Vol.  IV.,  No.  13,  p.  35. 


GENETIC   ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  69 

ordinary  life  activities.  In  the  development  of  a  rhythm,  the 
motor  activity  of  the  skeletal  muscles  plays  the  most  important 
role.  For  this  reason,  the  larger  movements  of  a  purposive  activity 
are  much  more  conducive  to  the  production  of  rhythm  than  the 
smaller  movements  which  accompany  the  purposeless  activity  of 
the  counting  method."  ^ 

Exactness  of  rhythmical  movement  having  been  com- 
munally acquired  by  the  individual,  the  process  can  now 
be  reversed;  and  the  individual  is  able  through  the  em- 
ployment of  rhythm  to  address  himself  immediately  to 
the  group  and  to  infuse  it  with  his  personal  emotions  to 
such  an  extent  that  individual  and  community  again  merge 
into  one.  The  dance,  music,  and  verse,  it  would  seem, 
therefore,  are  related  arts  in  that  all  are  dependent  upon 
the  human  appreciation  of  rhythm.  For  those  who  do  not 
possess  the  faculty  of  coordinating  either  movements  or 
sounds,  the  temporal  arts  do  not  exist. ^ 

"It  can  not  be  too  strongly  insisted  on,"  says  Robert  Mac- 
dougalP,  "that  the  perception  of  rhythm  is  an  impression,  an 
immediate  affection  of  consciousness  depending  on  a  particular 
kind  of  sensory  experience;  it  is  never  a  construction,  a  reflective 
perception  that  certain  relations  of  intensity,  duration,  or  what 
not,  do  obtain.  If  the  perception  of  rhythm  in  a  series  of  impres- 
sions were  dependent  on  intellectual  analysis  and  discrimination, 
the  existence  of  such  temporal  limits  as  are  actually  found  would 
be  inconceivable  and  absurd.  So  long  as  the  perception  of  the 
uniformity  or  proportion  of  the  time-relations  were  possible, 
together  with  the  discrimination  of  the  regular  recurrence  in  the 
series  of  points  of  accentuation,  the  perception  of  rhythm  should 
persist,  however  great  or  small  might  be  the  absolute  intervals 

1  P.  F.  Swindle:  "On  the  Inheritance  of  Rhythm,"  American  Journal 
of  Psychology,  XXIV.,  1913,  p.  203. 

^  Sir  John  Stainer:  "Music  in  its  Relation  to  the  Intellect  and  the 
Emotions,"  p.  28. 

^  "The  Structure  of  Simple  Rhythm  Forms,"  Psychological  Review, 
Monograph  Supplements,  Vol.  IV.,  Whole  No.  17,  Jan.,  1903,  p.  325. 


70       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

which  separated  the  successive  members  of  the  absolute  series. 
If  it  were  the  conception  of  a  certain  form  of  relation,  instead  of 
the  reception  of  a  particular  impression,  which  was  involved,  we 
should  reaUze  a  rhythm  which  extended  over  hours  or  days,  or 
which  was  comprehended  in  the  fraction  of  a  second,  as  readily 
as  those  which  actually  affect  us." 

Between  rhythm  performed  and  rhythm  perceived  cer- 
tain differences  must  be  noted.  Between  rhythm  in  nature 
and  rhythm  as  employed  by  art  still  further  distinctions 
must  be  drawn.  Because  of  the  multifold  aspects  of  the 
subject  of  rhythm  and  because  of  the  complexity  of  the 
problems  which  have  to  be  confronted,  no  matter  from 
what  point  of  view  the  approach  is  made,  researches  have 
been  most  productive  of  exact  information  when  they  have 
been  confined  to  some  particular  phase  of  the  problem. 
Yet  the  necessity  for  thus  limiting  the  horizon  has  mili- 
tated against  anything  like  a  comprehensive  view.  I 
have  very  grave  doubts  as  to  the  possibility  of  attaining 
such  a  conception  at  the  present  time.  The  best  that  can 
be  done  is  to  direct  the  mind  along  certain  suggestive  chan- 
nels of  thought,  leaving  to  the  future  the  determination  of 
cross  currents  and  eddies  as  well  as  the  making  of  more 
careful  soundings  in  the  channels  themselves. 

Throughout  nature,  whether  animate  or  inanimate,  some- 
thing resembling  rhythm  seems  to  prevail,  —  that  is,  there 
seems  to  be  more  or  less  strict  periodicity  rather  than  hap- 
hazard recurrence.^  It  is  found  in  the  planetary  motions, 
in  the  union  of  chemical  elements,  in  the  processes  of  plant 
life,  and  in  the  functioning  of  the  various  organs  of  the 
higher  as  well  as  of  the  lower  animals.  So  persistently 
does  it  come  before  us  in  the  beating  of  the  heart,  the  puls- 
ing of  the  blood  in  the  veins  and  the  arteries,  and  in  the 
rising  and  the  falling  of  the  chest  in  breathing,  that  not 
I  Fiske:   "Outlines  of  Cosmic  Philosophy,"  Vol.  II. 


GENETIC   ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  71 

infrequent  attempts  have  been  made  to  establish  the  exist- 
ence of  a  vital  connection  between  the  rhythms  of  art  and 
these  life  processes.^  I  shall  not  undertake  to  say  that  in 
particular  instances  they  do  or  they  do  not  maintain. 
I  do  wish  to  call  attention,  however,  to  the  rather  patent 
fact  that  all  human  activity  is  subject  to  the  limitations 
placed  upon  it  by  these  various  functionings  of  the  parts 
of  our  organism.  The  rate  at  which  any  process  is  repeated, 
though  uniform  in  the  main,  is,  nevertheless,  a  variable 
quantity.  The  rhythms  of  art  are  far  more  varied,  far 
more  complex;  and  it  yet  remains  to  be  satisfactorily 
demonstrated  that  there  is  any  great  degree  of  depend- 
ence of  the  rhythms  of  art  upon  these  periodic  functionings. 
Of  course,  within  certain  limits  art  must  accommodate  it- 
self to  nature.  Otherwise  art  would  be  an  impossibility. 
Some  of  the  rhythms  of  art  are  the  more  easily  sustained 
because  they  follow  in  a  general  way  the  periodic  rise  and 
fall  of  the  chest  in  breathing  or  the  systole  and  diastole 
movements  of  the  heart.  It  is  just  as  true,  however,  that 
other  rhythms  do  not  follow  these,  but  are  maintained  in 
spite  of  them.  I  might  even  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  they 
are  the  more  effective  for  requiring  a  greater  concentra- 
tion of  attention  and  a  greater  degree  of  effort  on  the  part 
of  both  the  producer  and  the  perceiver.^  Everything  de- 
pends upon  the  artistic  effect  to  be  realized. 

Art  may  turn  to  its  own  account  the  recurrent  phenom- 
ena  of  nature;  but  by  far  the  greater  number  of  these 
pass  unperceived  altogether,  or  they  are  grasped  only  after 
severe  exercise   of   the   powers   of   the   intellect.     Usually 

1  L.  Drozynski:  "Atmungs-  und  Pulssymt.  rhythmischer  Gefuhle,"' 
Psych.  Studien,  VII.,  1912. 

*  Harry  Porter  Weldt:  "An  Experimental  Study  of  Musical  En- 
joyment," p.  298,  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  XXIII.,  April,  1912.. 

V.  Benussi:  "Psychologie  d.  Zeitauffasung,"  p.  505,  (Heidelberg,. 
1913). 


72   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

they  occur  in  an  extent  of  time  either  too  large  or  too  small 
to  be  immediately  apprehended,  when,  to  be  available  for 
artistic  purposes,  it  is  essential  that  phenomena  be  re- 
stricted to  very  limited  extensions  of  time  or  space.  Rhythm 
does  not  exist  for  any  individual  until  it  becomes  an  affec- 
tion of  his  sensibility.  The  rhythm  of  a  succession  of  psy- 
choses is  the  only  rhythm  which  can  become  an  object  of 
direct  experience.  The  span  of  rhythmic  sensibility  is 
not  great.  Although  it  has  been  investigated  quite  fre- 
quently,^ about  all  that  can  be  said  concerning  it  for  verse 

1  Bolton:   "Rhythm,"  Amer.  Jour.  Psych.,  VI.,  pp.  145-238. 

Dietz:  "  Untersuchungen  iiber  den  Umfang  des  Bewusstseins  bei 
regelmassig  aufeinanderfolgenden  Schalleindriicken,"  Phil.  Stud.,  1885, 
II.,  383. 

Gurney:    "The  Power  of  Sound,"  p.  127. 

Lange:  "Beitriige  zur  Theorie  der  sinnUchen  Aufmerksamkeit  und 
der  activen  Apperception,"  Phil.  Stud.,  1888,  IV.,  p.  404. 

Johnson:  "Researches  in  Practice  and  Habit,"  Studies  in  the  Yale 
Psychological  Laboratory,  1898,  VI.,  p.  91. 

Marbe:  "Die  Schwankungen  der  Gesichtsempfindungen,"  Phil. 
Stud.,  1893,  VIII,  p.  615. 

Meumann:  "Untersuchungen  zur  Psychol ogie  und  Aesthetik  des 
Rhythmus,"  Phil.  Stud.,  1894,  X.,  p.  302. 

Pace:  "Zur  Frage  der  Schwankungen  der  Aufmerksamkeit  nach 
Versuchen  mit  Masson'schen  Schreiben,"  Phil.  Stud.,  1893,  VIII., 
p.  615. 

Martins:  Phil.  Stud.,  1891,  VI.,  p.  196. 

Schmidt:  "Introduction  to  the  Rhythmic  and  Metric  of  the  Classical 
Languages,"  79  ff. 

Sievers:   "Grundziige  der  Phonetik,"  2  Aufl.,  p.  218. 

Scripture:    "The  New  Psychology,"  p.  125. 

Smith:   Phil.  Stud.,  1900,  XVI.,  p.  282. 

Stevens:   "On  the  Time  Sense,"  Mind,  1886,  X.,  p.  394. 

Tichener:   "A  Primer  of  Psychology,"  p.  89. 

"An  Outline  of  Psychology,"  p.  89. 

"Experimental  Psychology,"  I.,  ii.  p.  340. 

Wallin:  "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  Studies  from  the 
Yale  Psychological  Laboratory,  IX.,  1901,  p.  72. 


GENETIC  ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  73 

intervals  is  that  it  falls  within  the  limits  set  by  five  seconds 
as  a  maximum  and  0.89  of  a  second  as  a  minimum,  or  per- 
haps it  may  even  exceed  these  slightly.^  Wallin  ^  sum- 
marizes the  entire  situation  as  follows :  — 

(A)  "While  the  differences  of  the  results  of  experiments  can 
be  partly  explained  by  differences  and  inconsistency  in  the  amount 
of  the  stimuU  and  in  the  physical  and  mental  conditions  of  the 
observers  (due  to  fatigue,  inattention,  irrelevant  movements, 
sensations  and  memory  images,  passive  or  active  attitude,  etc.), 
the  natural  period  of  attention  will  differ  for  the  different  senses 
and  for  different  individuals.  The  period  for  the  more  purely 
sensory  (receptive)  waves  may  also  differ  from  the  more  purely 
motor  (voluntary)  waves;  and  those  of  the  involuntary  subjective 
grouping  from  those  of  the  voluntary  grouping. 

(B)  "The  span  of  the  rhytlunic  sense  is  definitely  hmited  for 
each  individual,  though  we  do  not  yet  know  its  precise  upper  or 
lower  limits,  or  how  it  differs  in  voluntary  and  involuntary  sub- 
jective rhythmization,  in  its  sensory  and  motor  aspects,  nor  its 
dependence  on  the  psycho-physical  conditions  and  age  of  the 
individual. 

(C)  "The  regularity  of  intervals  will  be  greater  for  those  that 
fall  within  the  span  than  for  those  that  do  not." 

Merely  in  order  to  furnish  a  convenient  point  of  attack 
and  without  the  slightest  intention  of  accepting  his  state- 
ment of  the  case  as  final  (as,  indeed,  he  himself  does  not), 
I  wish  to  posit  as  a  working  definition  a  transcription  of 
the  words  of  Paul  Verrier :  —  ^ 

Rhythm  is  constituted  by  the  return  of  a  fixed  phenomenon  at  sen- 
sibly equal  intervals  of  time  or  space,  or,  still  more  exactly  expressed, 
by  the  return  of  the  sign  which  renders  the  division  of  time  or  of  space 
perceptible  to  the  hearing,  to  the  sight,  to  the  touch,  or  to  the  muscular 
sense. 

1  Wallin:    "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  72. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  69. 

^   "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  m(5trique  anglaise,"  II.,  p.  3. 


74       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

Although  it  is  often  very  convenient  to  illustrate  audi- 
tory rhythms  in  terms  of  rhythms  of  sight  and  the  struc- 
ture of  verse  in  terms  of  architecture,  after  all  there  is  but 
a  superficial  resemblance  between  the  two;  and  to  hold 
them  over  against  each  other  for  purposes  of  comparison 
is  likely  to  result,  as  it  certainly  has  resulted  in  one  par- 
ticular case,'^  in  a  maladjustment  of  focus  in  mental  vision. 

It  is  better,  therefore,  to  omit  all  consideration  of  sym- 
metry and  to  center  the  attention  exclusively  upon  the 
question  of  movement  in  time.  Certainly  in  three  of  the 
temporal  arts  the  sense  of  sight  contributes  nothing  what- 
soever.2  In  the  fourth,  dancing,  sight  is  involved  to  a 
considerable  degree;  but  even  here  it  is  not  essential.  Prose, 
verse,  and  music  appeal  with  equal  intensity  to  the  blind  as 
to  those  who  see;  nor  are  the  blind  altogether  shut  off  from 
the  enjoyment  of  dancing. 

The  temporal  arts  express  themselves  by  means  of  vi- 
b'rations  which  we  receive  in  one  of  two  ways  or  in  both, 
—  (1)  through  the  hearing,  (2)  through  the  muscular  sense. 
Perhaps  for  the  sake  of  completeness,  I  should  add  (3) 
through  the  touch  and  (4)  through  the  sight.  Though 
deaf,  dumb,  and  blind.  Misses  Laura  Bridgman  and  Helen 
Keller  were  fond  of  music  and  dancing.^  However,  every 
one  would  admit,  I  believe,  that  the  appeal  of  the  temporal 
arts  is  to  normal  human  beings  in  whom  the  sense  of  touch 
would  not  be  involved  at  all.     Sight  need  be   considered 

^  George  L.  Raymond:  "Rhythm  and  Harmony  in  Poetry  and 
Music  "  (G.  P.  Putnam,  New  York,  1909). 

^  This  statement  must  not  be  accepted  too  literally.  Both  opera  and 
drama  make  a  very  definite  appeal  to  sight,  though  here  again  sight 
is  not  essential.  This  categorical  nothing  whatsoever  I  shall  take  oc- 
casion to  qualify  in  more  than  one  particular  from  time  to  time. 

*  Belugnon,  L. :  "Une  nouvelle  Laura  Bridgman,"  in  Revue  Philo- 
sophique,  1889,  torn.  28,  p.  175.  Miss  Keller  has  now  learned  to  talk, 
I  imderstand. 


GENETIC  ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  75 

only  as  representing  a  transference  of  function,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  deaf  or  of  those  who  read  without  uttering  the 
sounds.  Of  course,  every  one  not  suffering  from  paralysis 
of  the  sensory  nerves  recognizes  as  rhythmical  certain 
methods  of  rubbing,  touching,  or  otherwise  stimulating  the 
skin;  and  all  who  see  can  be  made  to  apprehend  the  rhythm 
imposed  upon  flashes  of  light;  but  I  know  of  no  art  form  in 
which  these  experiences  are  contributory  in  even  a  negligi- 
ble degree  to  the  arousing  of  aesthetic  emotions. 

Our  tentative  definition  of  rhythm  in  general  may  now 
be  restricted  so  as  to  include  only  such  rhythms  as  are  met 
with  in  the  temporal  arts.  Rhythm  is  constituted  by  the  re- 
turn at  sensibly  equal  time  intervals  of  the  phenomenon  which 
renders  the  division  of  time  perceptible  to  the  hearing,  to  the 
sight,  or  to  the  muscular  sense.^ 

Here  three  factors  are  involved,  —  (1)  time,  actual  and 
relative;  (2)  some  phenomenon  to  aid  in  the  measurement 
of  time;  (3)  the  self,  as  the  originator  or  perceiver  of  the 
rhythm.  Each  of  these  has  called  for  specialized  investi- 
gation. One  group  of  psychologists  has  been  concerned 
with  analyzing  rhythm  as  an  immediate,  subjective  experi- 
ence, involving  factors  of  perception,  reaction,  memory, 
feeling,  and  the  like.^  Another  has  dealt  with  the  specific 
objective  conditions  under  which  this  experience  arises, 
and  the  efifect  of  changes  in  these  factors.*  A  third  has 
sought  to  coordinate  the  rhythm  experience  with  general 
laws  of  physiological  activity  and  repose.'*    A  fourth  has 

1  I  retain  to  the  sight  until  I  can  dispose  of  the  art  of  dancing. 

2  Angell  and  Pierce,  Ettlinger,  Hauptmann,  Mentz,  Meumann, 
Stumpf,  Wundt. 

'  Binet  and  Courtier,  Bolton,  Ebhardt,  Hurst  and  McKay,  Meumann, 
Sievers,  Macdougall,  Shaw  and  Wrinch. 

*  Bolton,  Briicke,  Dogiel,  Haushegger,  Holmes,  Mach,  Ribot,  Sher- 
rington, Scripture,  Smith,  Munsterberg,  Hughlings-Jackson,  J.  Minor, 
and  others. 


76        THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

undertaken  to  describe  the  historical  process  by  which  the 
various  rhythm  types  have  developed,  and  to  formulate 
the  laws  of  their  construction.^  Obviously,  even  a  cursory 
review  of  so  large  an  amount  of  material  is  beyond  the  scope 
of  a  book  such  as  this;  nor  is  a  resume  of  any  kind  perti- 
nent to  the  argument  which  is  to  follow.  Yet  a  careful 
selection  of  such  facts  as  appear  to  me  to  bear  immediately 
upon  the  specific  problems  that  arise  in  the  course  of  this 
investigation  ought  to  enable  me  to  avoid  imposing  an 
undue  burden  upon  the  attention  of  my  readers  without 
at  the  same  time  prejudicing  them  against  the  validity  of 
my  conclusions.  The  view  which  I  shall  take  of  rhythm 
must  be  subjectively  objective  throughout. 

Rhythm  as  applied  to  the  dance  involves  considerations 
of  both  time  and  space. ^  In  so  far  as  it  is  a  question  of 
movement  it  lies  within  the  domain  of  space,  into  contact 
with  the  limits  of  which  the  dancer  is  brought  by  the  con- 
traction and  the  relaxation  of  his  muscles.  These  contrac- 
tions and  relaxations  he  so  coordinates  that  they  occur 
at  relatively  fixed  intervals  of  time.  Sight  is  not  involved. 
For  communal  dancing  some  phenomenon  of  time  furnishes 
the  unifying  factor.  For  the  nonparticipant,  the  enjoy- 
ment of  the  dance  is  due  to  stimulation  of  the  optic  nerve. 
He  sees  the  movements  take  place;  and  these  movements 
he  perceives  as  bearing  sensibly  fixed  temporal  relations  to 
one  another.  His  perception  of  their  coordination  is  the 
more  intense  if  at  the  same  time  he  hears  some  phenom- 
enon or  phenomena  with  which  to  relate  them.  The 
hearing,  however,  is  not  at  all  essential.  For  both  dancer 
and  onlooker  it  is  primarily  a  question  of  the  perception  of 
movement  as  related  to  time  intervals.     Now,  it  so  hap- 

1  Biicher,  Moritz,  Scherer,  and  others. 

2  Beneke's  "Von  Takt  in  Tanz,  Gesang  und  Dichtung"  is  an  ex- 
treme case  of  genetic  explanation  of  rhythm. 


GENETIC  ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  77 

pens  that  out  of  the  desire  to  make  this  relationship  the 
more  immediately  felt  has  developed  tonal  art.  Here  it 
is  not  a  question  of  relationships  of  time  and  space,  but 
of  time  and  sound.  In  both  instances  perfectly  plastic 
phenomena  have  been  brought  under  the  control  of  the 
time-sense  of  the  aesthetic  self.  Since  the  moment  of  their 
inception,  the  lines  of  their  development  have  perforce  been 
different;  yet  each  has  contributed  to  the  advancement  of 
the  other  wherever  the  time-relations  of  movement  in  space 
could  be  made  to  overlap  the  time-relations  of  sound. 
Rhythm  they  have  in  common.  However,  in  order  to  gain 
concentration  of  attention  upon  the  rhythm  of  sound,  I  am 
compelled  to  exclude  from  consideration  the  rhythm  of 
the  dance.  The  time  relationships  are  the  same.  Only 
the  medium  of  expression  is  different.  Because  of  this 
difference  of  medium,  greater  clarity  can  be  gained  by 
concentrating  the  attention  upon  a  single  medium.  A  far 
more  specific  terminology  is  thus  made  possible,  and  the 
necessity  for  eternally  shifting  from  one  to  the  other  is 
eliminated.  Therefore,  I  shall  deliberately  confine  my 
discussion  of  rhythm  to  the  phenomena  of  sound.  In  con- 
sequence, it  is  necessary  to  alter  once  more  the  definition 
with  which  I  began.  Rhythm  is  constituted  by  the  return 
at  sensibly  equal  time  intervals  of  the  phenomenon  which 
renders  the  divison  of  time  perceptible  to  the  hearing  or  to  the 
muscular  sense. 

In  architecture,  painting,  and  sculpture,  the  element  of 
time  does  not  enter.  The  impression  is  instantaneous. 
It  is  the  now  abstracted  from  the  was  and  the  to  be.  It  is 
without  relation  to  either  past  or  future.  It  is  eternally 
static.  The  temporal  arts,  on  the  contrary,  can  exist  only 
as  the  past  and  the  future  can  be  drawn  into  relation  with 
the  present.  The  preceding  moment  must  not  have  faded 
from   consciousness  before  the   present  is  realized   and   a 


78       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

feeling  of  expectation  is  aroused  with  regard  to  the  future. 
Since  they  are  limited  to  time,  they  must  involve  succes- 
sion. Yet  it  is  a  succession  in  which  there  is  no  break.  In 
fact,  so  intimate  is  the  association  that  to  speak  of  the 
process  other  than  as  a  flowing,  a  continuum,  is  to  make 
mentally  a  division  which  in  reality  does  not  exist.  In  con- 
sciousness events  take  place  only  in  reference  to  other  events. 
The  temporal  arts,  therefore,  are  compelled  to  limit  them- 
selves to  the  use  of  such  phenomena  as  can  be  retained  in 
consciousness  for  such  a  length  of  time  as  is  necessary  for 
the  perception  of  these  phenomena  as  constituting  a  unity. 

The  acoustical  phenomena  available  for  artistic  purposes 
I  have  already  examined  from  the  standpoints  of  pitch, 
tone-color,  and  intensity.  The  problem  of  duration  must 
now  be  attacked.  When  that  has  been  disposed  of,  I  shall 
then  be  in  a  position  to  show  how  all  four  factors  may  in 
the  hands  of  the  artist  contribute  toward  the  establishment 
of  rhythm  and  the  building  up  of  an  aesthetic  whole. 

So  intimate  is  the  association  of  each  of  these  with  the 
others  that  it  is  well-nigh  impossible  to  abstract  from  a 
sound  any  one  of  its  characteristics.  In  the  examination 
of  tone-color,  for  instance,  the  sound  had  to  be  given  some 
time- value;  it  had  to  be  produced  at  a  definite  pitch;  and 
it  had  to  be  invested  with  a  certain  degree  of  intensity. 
The  best  that  could  be  done  was  to  keep  the  other  factors 
as  nearly  constant  as  possible  so  that  the  mind  would  not 
be  diverted  by  them  from  the  one  point  receiving  atten- 
tion. In  order,  therefore,  to  investigate  the  problem  of 
duration  psychologists  have  made  use  of  various  instru- 
ments. From  certain  of  these  the  sounds  to  be  reacted 
upon  by  the  subjects  are  nothing  more  than  clicks  of  uni- 
form intensity.  The  results  thus  obtained  if  applied  di- 
rectly to  the  solution  of  the  problems  of  art  lead  to  a  most 
egregious  blunder.     Still,  it  is  just  here  that  there  is  mani- 


GENETIC  ASPECTS  OF  RHYTHM  79 

fested  among  metrists  a  tendency  to  go  astray.  In  the 
next  chapter  I  shall  summarize  briefly  the  attitudes  and 
the  findings  of  several  schools  of  pyschologists  as  to  the 
meaning  of  time  and  the  interpretation  of  time  reactions, 
in  hope  of  avoiding  thereby  the  gins  and  the  snares  into 
which  others  have  fallen  through  their  failure  to  keep  these 
facts  before  them.  Later  I  can  return  to  the  application 
of  general  principles  to  the  specific  questions  raised  in  con- 
sidering the  rhythms  of  prose,  of  verse,  and  of  music. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
TIME 

Modern  experimental  psychology  approaches  the  prob- 
lem of  time  from  one  of  three  points  of  view.  In  the  first, 
as  developed  by  Dr.  Ernst  Mach  of  the  University  of 
Vienna/  tune  is  regarded  as  a  special  state  of  consciousness. 
In  the  second,  as  championed  by  Dr.  Hugo  Miinsterberg 
of  Harvard  University,^  the  conception  of  time  is  given  an 
exclusively  sensational  interpretation,  and  is  looked  upon 
as  being  attached  to  certain  special  states  of  consciousness. 
The  third,  or  Kantian,  view,  as  greatly  enlarged  by  Dr. 
Wilhelm  Wundt  of  the  University  of  Leipzig,^  is  the  basis 
for  the  modern  conception  of  time  as  an  immediate  experi- 
ence of  consciousness  in  general.  All  three  theories  have 
certain  ideas  in  common.  Of  some  of  these  I  shall  make 
use  in  attempting  to  develop  a  conception  of  rhythm  as 
intimately  associated  with  the  experience  of  duration  and 
as  related  to  other  more  or  less  abstract  problems  involv- 
ing considerations  of  time. 

Within  our  conscious  life  change  is  constantly  taking 
place.  "Presentations  wax  and  wane  in  distinctness  and 
intensity,  and  give  place  to  each  other;  attention  is 
shifting;  conation  is  constantly  undergoing  vicissitudes  of 
relative  success  and  failure  with  their  effective  accomplish- 
ments.    Now  the  bare  fact  of  the  existence  of  such  change 

1  "Beitrage  zur  Analyse  der  Empfindungen." 

2  "Beitrage  zur  experimentellen  Psychologie." 

^  " Physiologische  Psychologie"  and  "Outlines  of  Psychology." 

80 


TIME  81 

is  in  itself  irrelevant  to  the  problem  of  time-perception. 
The  essential  point  is  that  the  transition  involves  a  peculiar 
immediate  experience  which  we  may  call  the  experience 
of  transience."  ^  This  immediate  experience  of  transience 
is  momentary  in  character,  —  that  is,  it  is  confined  to  the 
moment  in  which  it  is  being  felt,  a  very  "knife-edge"  of 
experience,  as  Professor  James  terms  it.  In  its  immediacy 
it  is  distinct  from  all  that  has  preceded  and  from  all  that  is 
to  follow.  This  is  for  us  the  present;  yet,  what  we  usually 
refer  to  as  the  present  is  not  this  kind  of  a  present  but  one 
extending  both  into  the  past  and  toward  the  future.  "It 
has  a  certain  breadth  of  its  own,  .  .  .  from  which  we  look 
in  two  directions  into  time.  The  unit  of  composition  of 
our  perception  of  time  is  a  duration  with  a  bow  and  a  stern, 
as  it  were  a  rearward-  and  a  forward-looking  end."  ^ 
Psychologists  speak  of  this  popular  conception  of  the  pres- 
ent as  the  specious  present,  a  present  with  real  duration, 
"in  which  each  form  flows  out  of  previous  forms,  while 
adding  to  them  something  new,  .  .  .  explained  by  them  as 
much  as  it  explains  them."  ^  Because  we  are  able  to  recall 
experiences  which  have  preceded  the  present  and  to  antic- 
ipate those  which  are  to  come,  we  are  brought  to  a  realiza- 
tion of  both  the  past  and  the  future.  The  just  now  is 
brought  into  relation  to  the  now,  and  the  about  to  be  with 
the  is.  The  immediate  past  moves  into  the  present,  and 
the  present  on  toward  the  immediate  future.  Extend  the 
range  of  this  ability  to  recall  and  to  anticipate,  and  the 
present  becomes  a  moment  in  a  moving  continuum  of  ex- 
perience from  which  by  an  act  of  attention  certain  moments 

1  G.  F.  Stout:    "A  Manual  of  Psychology"   (Hinds,  Noble,  and 
Eldridge,  New  York,  third  edition,  1915),  p.  520. 

2  James:    "Principles  of  Psychology,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  609. 

^  Henri  Bergson:    "Creative  Evolution"  (Henry  Holt,  New  York, 
1911),  p.  362. 


82   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

already  experienced  may  be  abstracted  and  again  made  a 
part  of  the  present  experience,  and  likewise  moments  from 
the  noi-yet  experienced  may  become  an  ideal  representa- 
tion of  the  to  he  in  the  now.  Time  has  but  one  dimension. 
It  is  a  continuous  flow  which  must  always  be  judged  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  present  moment;  yet  no  moment  of  time 
is  like  any  other  moment,  and  no  moment  can  ever  return. 
No  experience  of  the  self  is  without  duration.  Only 
certain  phases  of  this  experience  have  been  investigated, 
however.  Wundt^  has  shown  that  an  interval  of  one-fifth 
of  a  second  is  most  favorable  for  the  accurate  union  of 
auditory  impressions.  Longer  intervals  are  a  strain  upon 
the  expectation;  shorter  soon  become  fatiguing,  so  that 
in  both  instances  errors  of  judgment  are  quick  to  arise. 
Others  agree  with  him  in  saying  that  there  is  a  standard 
unit  of  time  by  which  we  measure  its  passage,  though  this 
standard  is  by  no  means  absolute.  It  differs  with  indi- 
viduals, and  even  with  the  same  individual  at  different 
times;  yet  the  closer  the  approximation  to  it,  the  greater 
the  accuracy  of  judgment.^  Intervals  shorter  than  this 
unit  of  time  tend  to  approach  it.^    They  can  not  be  meas- 

1  Wilhelm  Wundt:   "Outlines  of  Psychology,"  p.  149. 

*  Kiilpe:    "Outlines  of  Psychology." 

Ernst  Meumann:  "  Untersuchungen  zur  Psychologie  und  Aesthetik 
des  Rhythmus"  (Leipzig,  1894),  reprinted  from  Vol.  X.  of  Wundt's 
Philosophische  Studien. 

F.  Schumann:  Zeitschrift  fiir  Psychologie,  Bd.  XVIII.,  p.  1. 

Shaw  and  Wrinch:  "Contribution  to  the  Psychology  of  Time," 
University  of  Toronto  Studies,  Psychological  Series,  No.  2,  1899.  On 
page  30  one-half  second  is  given  as  the  unit  of  time. 

^  Kiilpe:   Ihid. 

Ernst  Meumann:   Ibid. 

Shaw  and  Wrinch:  Ihid.,  Tables  III.,  IV.,  V. 

Hurst  and  McKay:  "Experiments  on  the  Time  Relations  of  Poetical 
Measures,"  University  of  Toronto  Studies,  Psychological  Studies, 
No.  3,  1899,  p.  66. 


TIME  83 

ured  individually,  but  must  be  grouped  into  a  series  which 
divides  itself  into  approximations  of  the  unit  or  of  multi- 
ples thereof.^  Intervals  longer  than  the  unit  of  time  are 
measured  in  terms  of  the  unit  or  in  multiples  thereof,  here 
represented  by  some  organic  function.^  The  unit  of  time 
is  a  psychic  compound  containing  both  objective  and  sub- 
jective factors,  in  which,  however,  the  objective  seem  to 
have  the  stronger  influence.  "It  may  be  some  organic 
function,  or  multiple  of  such,  which  has  accustomed  us  to 
the  duration  which  is  our  unit  more  than  any  other,  or 
the  unit  of  some  objective  impression  or  interval  to  which 
we  have  always  been  accustomed  may  have  played  the 
fundamental  part  in  its  formation."  ^  Of  course,  neither 
in  organic  functions  nor  in  phenomena  of  any  kind  is  there 
time;  but,  because  some  of  the  functions  are  both  continu- 
ous and  regular,  the  mind  may  seize  upon  them  as  a  standard 
by  which  to  measure  not  only  their  own  rate  of  functioning 
but  also  the  rate  at  which  phenomena  present  themselves 
to  consciousness. 

Miinsterberg's  experiments  undoubtedly  prove  that  there 
is  no  special  time-sense  in  our  consciousness;  but  they  do 
not  disprove  that  in  measuring  moderately  short  intervals 
we  compare  the  actual  time-lengths  themselves.  Neither 
do  they  prove  that  the  sensations  arising  from  muscular 
relaxations  and  tensions  are  the  only  means  whereby  we 
may  experience  immediately  the  passage  of  time,  though 
undoubtedly  these  sensations  do  bring  about  changes  in 
the  content  of  consciousness.     Smith  *  speaks  of  rhythm 

^  E.  Meumann:  Ibid.  Kiilpe:  Ibid.,  sec.  65.  Shaw  and  Wrinch: 
Ibid.,  p.  10;  and  the  unpublished  experiments  made  at  the  University 
of  Toronto  as  quoted  by  Shaw  and  Wrinch.  Max  Miiller  is  also  quoted 
as  responsible  for  these  data. 

*  Shaw  and  Wrinch:  Ibid.,  p.  20. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  21. 

*  Philosophische  Studien,  1900,  XVI.,  p.  291. 


84       THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

as  a  progressive  emotion  with  coordinated  motor  discharges. 
Nichols  ^  has  showed  that  sustained  attention  to  a  rhythm 
may  alter  our  perception  of  preceding  and  succeeding  time 
intervals;  and  Meumann-  has  added  the  facts  that  the  in- 
tensity of  the  limiting  sensations  rather  than  the  content 
of  time  intervals,  except  in  long  intervals,  as  well  as  aesthetic 
considerations  of  pleasure  and  of  pain,  must  be  taken  into 
account.  Lipps  ^  stresses  even  more  strongly  than  Meu- 
mann  the  associative  character  of  the  aesthetic  feelings. 
A  more  exact  statement  of  the  case  than  that  given  it  by 
Miinsterberg  is  probably  this :  — 

"From  the  fact  that  intervals  whose  limiting  sensations  fall  in 
similar  phases  of  respiration  are  much  more  accurately  measured 
than  others  which  are  independent  of  any  organic  function  of  the 
body,  it  can  only  be  inferred  that  the  organic  functions  of  the  body 
provide  data  which  enable  the  mind  more  accurately  to  estimate 
the  intervals  in  which  they  occur.  .  .  .  Time  is  nothing  without 
the  facts  of  consciousness,  but  it  is  a  property  of  all  facts,  all 
processes."  * 

Unity  of  experience  is  the  keynote  of  time  perception. 
"There  is  no  cleft  between  psychical  and  physical  proceed- 
ings, nothing  purely  internal  or  external,  no  sensation  to 
which  a  thing  as  such  different  and  independent  from  sen- 
sation would  correspond."  ^  Time  does  not  exist  apart 
from  the  facts  of  consciousness.  As  a  property  of  all  facts 
and  all  consciousness,  by  a  voluntary  act  it  may  be  placed 

1  "Psychology  of  Time,"  p.  94. 

2  Philosophische  Studien,  X.,  p.  264. 

'  "  Aesthetische  Einfiihlung,"  Zeit.  f.  Psychol,  u.  Physiol.,  CXXII., 
p.  441. 

*  Shaw  and  Wrinch:  Ibid.,  p.  12. 

*  Mach:   "Beitrage  zur  Analyse  der  Empfindungen,"  p.  141. 
James  in  his  "  Psychology  "  and  Ernst  Grosse  in  his  pamphlet  on 

''Spencer's  Lehre  von  dem  Unerkennbaren "  also  favor  this  view  of 
within  and  without. 


TIME  85 

in  the  center  of  attention;  and,  thus  abstracted,  its  relation 
to  other  properties  may  be  investigated.  Each  fact  of 
experience  is  brought  by  the  mind  into  connection  with 
other  facts.  In  this  process  of  unifying  experience  time  is 
implied;   or,  as  Shaw  and  Wrinch  very  lucidly  express  it: 

"Time  is  a  constant  factor,  not  only  of  the  self,  the  unity  of 
the  immediate  experience,  but  of  every  conscious  process  which 
goes  to  make  up  the  self.  By  the  union  of  sensations  and  feeUngs 
or  effective  elements,  which  are  obtained  by  abstraction  and  anal- 
ysis of  the  facts  of  experience,  a  psychic  compound  is  formel, 
whose  nature  depends  not  so  much  on  its  component  elements  as 
upon  their  union.  When  these  compounds  again  are  united,  the 
result  is  more  than  the  sum  of  the  compounds."  ^ 

Psychic  compounds  are  processes  embracing  all  the 
components  of  psychic  experience.  Time-presentations, 
being  of  the  nature  of  psychic  compounds,  are  continuously 
changing,  continuously  uniting  with  other  compounds  in 
the  formation  of  more  intimate  connections.  Time  com- 
pounds are  composed  of  both  sensational  and  affective  ele- 
ments, though  the  sensational  usually  predominate.  The 
so-called  inner-toiich  sensations  furnish  us  with  a  series  of 
affective  elements  made  up  of  feelings  of  strained  expec- 
tation followed  by  feelings  of  fulfilment.  These,  when 
combined  with  the  still  more  important  sensations  of  hear- 
ing, are  the  basis  for  oui*  judgments  of  time.  Time,  I  re- 
peat, is  a  constant  factor  of  conscious  life,  inseparable  from 
the  continuum  of  consciousness. 

An  examination  of  auditory  sensations  yields  a  number 
of  facts  of  unusual  value  to  the  student  of  rhythm.  (1) 
The  sensations  which  go  to  make  up  our  idea  of  time  are 
confined  to  the  end  of  single  intervals.  (2)  During  the  in- 
terval there  is  an  absence  of  almost  all  objective  sensation. 

1  Shaw  and  Wrinch:  Ibid.,  p.  14. 


86       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

There  is,  however,  a  very  noticeable  affective  content  of 
strained  expectation  followed  by  a  feeling  of  fulfilment. 
Then,  too,  tension  of  the  tympanic  membrane  and  of  other 
parts  of  the  ear  enters  as  a  fm-ther  sensational  element. 
But  by  far  the  most  important  consideration  in  determin- 
ing auditory  judgments  of  time  is  the  subjective  self. 
Through  it  ideas  not  only  of  expectation  and  fufilment  and 
of  unity  but  also  of  pleasure  and  of  pain  and  of  a  certain 
degree  of  emotion  are  brought  into  play.  Investigation, 
therefore,  must  follow  two  general  lines: — (l)  It  must  seek 
to  determine  what  are  the  phenomena  marking  the  end  of 
single  time-intervals  and  how  these  phenomena  affect  our 
perception  of  time;  (2)  It  must  examine  the  phenomena 
that  make  up  the  content  of  time-intervals  and  must  seek 
to  show  in  what  manner  these  phenomena  influence  our 
perception  of  time.  This  is  the  method  of  procedure  which 
I  shall  follow. 

A  most  noteworthy  distinction,  applicable  alike  to  the 
dance,  to  music,  and  to  both  prose  and  verse,  is  brought 
out  by  Dr.  Richard  Wallaschek  in  his  excellent  discussion 
of  the  difference  between  time  and  rhythm.     It  is  this:  — 

Suppose  beats  from  an  electric  hammer  are  made  to  follow  each 
other  in  equal  and  regular  succession.  They  will  "always  present 
the  same  monotonous  rhythmical  movement,  but  the  observer's 
mind  may  assume  different  attitudes  of  observation,  may  change 
the  time  division  by  altering  the  length  of  the  periods  (bars),  or 
uniting  another  number  of  beats  into  one  group.  The  rhythm 
is  in  the  object,  while  the  time-division  is  only  the  form  in  which 
our  mind  perceives  the  rhythm,  arranges,  systematizes,  unites 
the  sensations  of  several  beats  into  one  whole  period,  into  time- 
unity.  It  must  be  noted  that  this  time-sense  of  the  observer,  his 
ability  to  arrange  regular  sensations  into  periods,  to  perceive  them 
not  as  single  beats,  is  an  immediate  (intuitive)  perception,  i.e.,  the 
observer  does  not  arrive  at  this  form  of  group  perception  through 
counting  the  number  of  beats  which  make  up  the  group  (bar  or 


TIME  87 

period),  but  he  immediately  perceives  the  group  as  such  without 
the  mediimi  of  counting.  .  .  . 

"One  and  the  same  rhythm  may  be  perceived  in  different  time, 
one  and  the  same  time  may  contain  different  rhythms.  If  we  our- 
selves, not  the  electric  hammer,  are  the  performers  of  the  move- 
ment, we  should  very  soon  alter  the  accentuation  in  accordance 
with  the  alteration  of  the  time-division,  but  this  would  be  only  a 
probable  and  not  a  necessary  coincidence;  for  in  spite  of  an  ac- 
centuation which  is  Ukely  to  suggest  say  triple-time,  the  observer 
may  still  follow  double  time  in  his  thought,  to  such  an  extent 
can  rhythm  and  time  be  kept  distinct  from  each  other.  In  one 
word:  rhythm  is  the  form  of  objective  movement,  time-sense 
(mesure,  Takt)  the  form  of  the  perceiving  subjective  mind.  .  .  . 
The  time-sense  is  not  a  sensation  proper  as  hearing,  seeing,  etc., 
but  a  mental  work  of  grouping  the  sensations,  and  this  takes 
place  not  in  the  senses  themselves  but  in  the  cortex.  .  .  . 

"The  intrinsic  character  of  time  ...  is  not  in  its  being  beaten, 
but  its  being  known,  it  is  not  the  movement  of  the  conductor's 
arm,  but  the  form  of  his  intellectual  perception  of  music  in  which 
his  muscular  sense  alone  helps  him  nothing.  I  admit  that  in  the 
music  of  primitive  times,  owing  to  its  connection  with  bodily 
movements,  it  was  the  muscular  impression  as  much  as  the  audi- 
tory, that  gave  rise  to  the  time-ordered  perception.  But  I  can 
never  admit  that  the  perception  and  the  movement  (time  and 
rhythm)  are  identical."  ^ 

In  the  light  of  what  I  have  already  said,  I  shall  not  pause 
now  to  point  out  that  there  need  not  necessarily  be  move- 
ment or  vasomotor  discharges,  but  only  motor  impulses,  or, 
it  may  be,  only  mental  beats.  Nor  need  I  comment  upon 
the  degree  of  importance  that  should  be  assigned  to  the 
muscular  sense,  to  the  auditory  impression,  to  the  intellec- 
tual perception,  or  to  anything  else.  Kinsesthesis  of  some 
sort  is  essential  to  the  establishment  of  a  rhythmic  per- 
ception,  but    this    perception    once    established,  however, 

1  Richard  Wallaschek:  "On  the  Difference  of  Time  and  Rhythm  in 
Music,"  Mind,  New  Series,  Vol.  IV.,  No.  13,  pp.  28-35. 


88   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

rhythm  may  be  "consciously  carried,  in  the  absence  of 
kinsesthesis  of  any  sort,  by  auditory  or  visual  processes."  ^ 
For  me  the  crux  of  the  matter  is  found  in  Wallaschek's 
recognition  of  the  fact  that  rhythm  is  the  form  of  objec- 
tive movement,  time-sense  {mesure,  Takt)  the  form  of  the  per- 
ceiving subjective  mind.  By  way  of  illustration,  suppose 
we  think  of  time  as  a  blank  tape  moving  past  us  at  a 
uniform  rate  of  speed.  In  order  to  measure  this  tape  we 
must  apply  to  it  the  yard-stick  furnished  us  by  our  unit  of 
time.     The  line 

may  then  be  divided  thus: 

\ \ \ \ I 


thus: 


or  in  an  innumerable  number  of  ways.  Suppose  now  that 
there  begins  to  pass  before  us  on  the  tape  a  succession  of 
intervals  such  as  this :  — 

''^^  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r 

We  may  perceive  at  once  that  the  intervals  are  both  equal 
and  periodic.  Almost  immediately,  however,  we  tire  of 
the  succession;  and  it  is  only  by  grouping  the  intervals 
that  we  are  able  to  follow  them  at  all.^  Our  unit  of  time 
may  cause  us  to  group  them  so: 


^^^  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  r  1  r  r  r  r  r » 

1  C.  A.  Ruckmich:  "The  Role  of  Kinsesthesis  in  the  Perception  of 
Rhythm,  with  a  BibUography  of  Rhythm,"  American  Journal  of  Psy- 
chology, 1913,  XXIV.,  p.  359. 

^  J.  P.  Hylan:  "The  Fluctuation  of  Attention,"  Psychological  Mono- 
graphs, Vol.  II.,  No.  6,  Review  Publishing  Company,  Lancaster,  Pa. 


TIME  89 

or  so: 

<^'  r'rTf  rfr  rfr  rfTr  rTr 

or  in  any  other  manner;  but  group  them  we  must.  (A) 
represents  the  periodically  recurring  phenomenon  which 
the  subjective  self  arranges  as  in  (B)  or  (C).  Art,  how- 
ever, never  presents  its  material  in  any  such  form  as  (A). 
There  is  always  given  in  the  material  itself  something  which 
forces  us  to  measure  it  in  a  certain  way.  The  material 
comes,  before  consciousness  grouped,  unified;  and,  in  per- 
ceiving the  material,  consciousness  simultaneously  per- 
ceives the  grouping;  or,  to  put  it  slightly  differently,  the 
material  is  perceived  in  groups.  Thus  it  frequently  hap- 
pens that  a  given  rhythm  may  be  perceived  against  a  back- 
ground of  3/4  or  of  4/4  time,  or  that  different  rhythms  may 
be  perceived  against  a  common  background.     For  instance, 

I  may  take  the  rhythmic  pattern  f  f  f  ',    and,  conceiving 

3 

it  against  a  background  of  3/4  time,  I  may  write  it:   - 

3  3  3  I 

•pfjfjfjpp  or,  conceivmg  it  agamst  a  back- 
ground of  4/4  time,   I  may  write  it: 

"*  3  3  3  3  I 

4C/^l;^l/^'^''^';^^'l 

Richard  Wagner  is  very  partial  to  such  a  method  of  pro- 
cedure as  this.  A  notable  example  is  to  be  found  in  the 
"Overture  to  Tannhauser,"  the  first  part  of  which  is  writ- 
ten in  3/4  time,  the  second  in  4/4.  In  both  parts  the 
same  rhythmic  theme  appears  in  such  a  way  as  to  produce 
an  identical  effect.  Different  rhythmic  patterns  against 
the  same  time  background  ought  to  be  too  well  known  to 


90 


THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 


need  illustration;    but  the  citing  of  an  extreme  case  may 
make  my  point  a  little  clearer.     The  following  fragment^ 

-J- 


etc. 


^  I  have  here  in  abstract  seven  temporal  recurrences,  —  that  is, 
seven  periodicities.  Three  are  of  duration;  three  are  of  intensity; 
one  is  of  pitch. 

A.   Those  of  duration  are: 


<"  r     r     r     r 

<''  c  c  f  r  c  c  r  f  c  c  c  c  etc 

'^'  r    r    f    r    r    r 


etc. 


etc. 


The  tempo    of  (1)  is  slower  than  that  of   (2)  and  (3),  which  are  equal. 

One  note  of  (1)  has  the  same  absolute  time  value  as  three  notes  of  (2). 

B.    The  periodicities  of  intensity  are  imposed  upon  those  of  duration. 

Theoretically  the  former  have  no  length.     They  are  simply  periodic 

(1)  r     r     r     r 

^'^  tt  t  ci  c  t:  t :  t  ^  e'"- 

(3)    r  r  r  i  .  ^  etc. 

increases  in  the  intensity  of  sounds  which  have  length.     Graphically 
they  might  be  represented  after  this  manner:  — 


TIME  91 

from  F.  Chopin's  "Valse"  (Opus  42)  is  written  in  3/4  time. 
It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  left  hand  keeps  to  a  rhythm 

The  sound  is  struck  with  unusual  intensity.  It  begins  to  die  out  almost 
immediately;  but  before  its  vibration  ceases  another  sound  has  super- 
seded it.     A  dot  is  written  above  each  note  that  is  to  be  stressed. 

(a)    Tempo  means  the  actual  time  value  of  a  note  as  expressed  in 
fractions  of  a  minute. 

C.   The  lowest  bass  notes,  as  they  occur  at  regular  intervals,  furnish 
a  periodicity  of  pitch. 


^-i 


etc. 


It  can  now  be  seen  that  three  of  these  always  coincide  in  the  first 
beat  of  each  measure.  Their  coincidence  furnishes  the  ear  with  a 
composite  sound  of  particular  prominence  that  can  be  seized  upon  as 
the  measure  of  the  unit  of  time.  The  hearer  is  made  the  more  keenly 
aware  of  time  in  being  thus  aided  in  his  measurement  of  it.  Any  one  of 
these  periodicities,  if  occurring  alone,  would  not  be  sufficient  to  force  the 
ear  to  follow  any  particular  method  of  grouping.  Since  it  is  impossible 
to  sustain  attention  without  grouping,  the  ear  would  have  been  forced 
to  adopt  a  subjective  grouping  of  its  own,  which  might  not  have 
been  at  all  the  grouping  which  the  hearer  has  in  this  instance  been  forced 
to  adopt.  This  prominent,  composite  sound  itself  establishes  a  periodi- 
city, the  relative  value  of  the  units  within  which  determines  what  the 
time  shall  be  felt  to  be.  If  it  is  felt  to  be  divided  into  three  parts,  it 
is  for  the  hearer  3/4  time,  as  given  in  the  signature.  If  he  listens  only 
to  the  melody,  he  must  feel  it  to  be  2/4.  As  in  this  particular  case 
the  accompaniment  is  the  more  prominent  rhythmically,  the  time  is 
felt  in  units  subdivided  into  three  parts;  therefore,  it  is  heard,  as 
written,  in  3/4  time. 

Perhaps  it  has  already  been  objected  that  time  in  this  sense  of  the 
word  is  not  the  same  thing  as  time  in  the  sense  in  which  it  was  originally 
introduced,  or  that,  at  the  least,  the  latter  is  a  highly  technical  use  of 
the  term  as  applied  only  to  music.     But  let  us  see. 

Out  of  the  vast  continuum  of  time  we  are  accustomed  to  settle  upon 
some  particular  occurrence  in  nature  and  with  this  as  a  starting  point 
to  reckon  events  in  relation  to  it.  We  might  make  the  spring  equinox 
the  point  of  reckoning;  or  we  might  make  it  the  first  appearance  of  the 
new  moon.     But  suppose  for  convenience  we  make  it  the  moment  when 


92   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

which  makes  this  3/4  time  very  marked.  The  right  hand, 
on  the  contrary,  maintains  a  rhythm  in  2/4  time.  This 
fusion  of  the  two  is  made  possible  because  both  are  really 
working  against  a  background  of  6/8  time  in  which  the 

the  sun  reaches  the  meridian.  Within  the  span  of  time  from  noon  to 
noon  we  may  then  make  any  f mother  artificial  division  which  we  care  to. 
We  can  think  of  it  as  divided  into  day  and  night,  —  roughly  speaking 
into  halves;  for  we  can  think  of  it  as  divided  into  twenty-fourths,  — 
that  is,  into  hours.  Now  let  us  reckon  time  from  the  first  of  January, 
in  which  case  our  unit  of  measurement  is  the  year.  We  can  divide  the 
year  into  months  and  into  weeks  —  both  perfectly  arbitrary  divisions. 
(1)  In  speaking  of  months  we  are  thinking  of  the  year  as  divided  into 
twelfths.  We  can  group  these  months  in  units  of  three,  in  which  case 
we  think  of  the  seasons  as  fractions  of  time.  We  are  dividing  our 
larger  time  unit  into  twelfths  and  then  grouping  these  twelfths  by  threes. 
Each  season  is  represented  by  the  fraction  3/months,  or  3/l2.  Any 
event  taking  place  in  one  of  the  seasons  is  occupying  some  part  of  this 
3/12  division  of  time.  (2)  When  speaking  of  weeks,  we  are  thinking  of 
the  year  as  divided  into  fifty-sixths.  We  can  group  these  weeks  in 
units  of  two,  four,  seven,  or  eight,  as  we  please.  If  we  group  them  by 
sevens,  we  think  of  the  divisions  of  the  year  in  terms  of  the  fraction 
7/weeks,  or  7/56;  if  by  eighths,  in  terms  of  the  fraction  S/weeks, 
or  8/56. 

Now  carry  this  same  method  of  thought  into  the  realm  of  art.  Out 
of  the  continuum  of  time  we  select  as  the  unit  the  time-length  required 
to  produce  a  given  composition.  Then  we  decide  to  make  the  crotchet 
\\),  or  quarter  note  as  it  is  now  called,  the  unit  for  subdivision.  We 
further  select  to  group  these  crotchets  in  threes.  To  indicate  to  the 
person  who  is  to  interpret  the  composition  the  grouping  which  we  wish 
him  to  follow,  we  write  at  the  beginning  of  our  composition  3 /crotchets, 
or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  3/4.  Into  each  division,  therefore,  he  will 
put  three  crotchets  or  the  equivalent  thereof.  The  time  unit  will  be 
three  crotchets,  which,  relative  to  the  whole  composition,  represents 
a  definite  period  of  time.  Within  this  unit,  as  it  is  repeated  in  passing, 
an  almost  indefinite  number  of  rhythms  (related  time  events)  may  be 
presented  to  consciousness.  The  one  requirement  is  that  each  rhythm 
be  capable  of  being  fitted  into  this  matrix  of  time  without  thereby 
having  its  own  peculiar  pattern  destroyed,  or  without  interrupting  the 
flow  of  the  other  rhythmic  patterns. 


TIME  93 

melody  is  accenting  the  first  and  the  third  beats,  while 
the  accompaniment  is  accenting  the  first,  the  third,  and  the 
fifth.  This  sort  of  thing  is  entirely  too  complicated  ever 
to  find  use  in  verse.  There  only  one  voice  is  sounding, 
and  that,  too,  without  accompaniment,  so  that  unless  the 
rhythm  is  very  plainly  marked  it  cannot  be  followed.  Yet, 
for  prose  nor  verse  nor  music  would  any  degree  of  art  be 
possible  if  numerous  rhythmic  patterns  could  not  be  pre- 
sented against  a  uniform  background  of  time.  All  that  is 
required  is  for  these  rhythmic  patterns  to  be  capable  of 
being  brought  into  relationship  with  one  another  through 
the  common  medium  of  a  uniform  time-division.  When 
these  rhythmic  patterns  are  presented  to  consciousness, 
they  appear  inseparably  woven  together  in  a  continuous 
flow  of  measured  time.  In  fact,  in  them  lie  the  data  fur- 
nishing the  content  of  time.  To  separate  them  from  each 
other  or  from  consciousness  is  to  be  guilty  of  an  abstraction, 
excusable  only  because  it  is  impossible  to  grasp  their  inter- 
relation without  first  bringing  each  factor  of  the  continuum 
individually  before  the  attention.  So  long  as  this  essential 
indivisibility  is  kept  in  view,  it  does  not  matter  whether 
we  think  of  rhythm  as  embedded  in  measured  time  or  as 
imposing  itself  as  a  measure  upon  time.  Rhythm  is  made 
perceptible  through  the  instrumentality  of  measured  time; 
time  is  made  perceptible  through  the  content  furnished  by 
rhythm. 

Let  me  repeat  once  more  the  definition  of  rhythm  with 
which  I  began  my  discussion  of  the  rhjrthms  of  tone.  Rhythm 
is  constituted  by  the  return  at  sensibly  equal  time- intervals  of 
the  phenomenon  which  renders  the  division  of  time  perceptible 
to  the  hearing  or  to  the  muscular  sense.  Clearly  this  is  not 
a  very  good  description  of  the  beast  we  have  just  left  in 
the  wood.  Yet  what  need  is  there  to  point  out  the  par- 
ticulars in  which  this  verbal  photograph  is  not  what  might 


94       THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

be  called  a  striking  likeness?  It  was  brought  forward 
for  inspection  principally  in  order  that,  by  keeping  it  be- 
fore us  as  our  own  ideas  of  rhythm  expanded,  we  might 
gradually  outgrow  its  conception  and  be  able  to  lay  it,  and 
many  more  like  it,  aside  as  inadequate  accounts  without 
having  to  examine  them  in  detail  either  to  refute  or  to  amend 
them.  Letting  what  I  have  already  said  furnish  a  basis 
for  further  argument,  I  shall  now  begin  to  build  up  defini- 
tions which  I  hope  will  not  prove  altogether  unsatisfactory 
statements  of  the  nature  of  the  phenomena  which  make 
possible  the  arts  of  prose,  verse,  and  music. 


CHAPTER  IX 
RHYTHM    DEFINED 

In  Chapter  VII  I  spoke  of  something  resembling  rhythm 
as  being  of  common  occurrence  throughout  nature;  and 
I  gave  planetary  motions,  chemical  reactions,  and  biological 
functioning  as  typical  examples.  In  doing  this  I  was  per- 
fectly aware  of  employing  with  exceeding  looseness  as  a 
means  of  expressing  general  considerations  terms  the  ap- 
phcation  of  which  I  now  wish  to  limit  very  materially  in 
attempting  to  present  my  thought  in  more  detail  and  with 
greater  accuracy.  I  must  retrace  my  steps,  therefore, 
and,  as  I  again  go  over  the  same  ground,  confine  myself 
to  the  exact  and  the  particular. 

Such  a  succession  of  dots  as  the  following 


may  be  looked  upon  as  the  recurrence  of  the  same  phenom- 
enon (.)  at  unequal  intervals  of  space.  They  do  not  form 
a  series,  nor  are  they  related  in  any  way.  Now  bring  these 
dots  together  so  that  each  dot  is  exactly  the  same  distance 
from  the  two  adjacent  dots;  thus,  — 


Again  there  is  recurrence  of  the  same  phenomenon;  but 
this  time  each  dot  bears  the  same  spacial  relation  to  the 
dot  preceding  and  the  dot  following.     The  dots  are  ar- 

95 


96   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

ranged  at  equal  intervals  of  space.  Therefore,  they  are 
periodic  in  occurrence.  Suppose  this  second  line  of  dots, 
instead  of  representing  measurements  of  space,  be  made 
to  represent  such  regular  occurrences  in  time  as  the  cross- 
ing of  the  equator  by  the  sun  or  as  the  crossing  of  the  mer- 
idian by  a  fixed  star.  The  former  phenomenon  would  have 
a  period  of  six  months,  the  latter  of  twenty-four  hours; 
yet  the  moment  of  transit  for  each  would  be  just  like  every 
other  moment  of  transit.  There  would  be  unbroken  perio- 
dicity caused  by  the  recurrence  of  the  same  phenomenon. 
To  grasp  such  a  series  immediately  would  be  a  physical 
impossibility,  first  of  all  because  of  the  length  of  the  time- 
intervals  involved;  second,  because  the  succession  itself 
presents  to  the  mind  no  tangible  means  of  grouping. 

Consideration  of  the  matter  of  breathing  or  of  the  beat- 
ing of  the  heart  leads  to  much  the  same  result,  though  in 
each  of  these  instances  two  phenomena,  instead  of  one,  are 
concerned.  Representing  the  expansion  by  —  and  the 
contraction  by  —  ,  the  succession  is  as  follows :  — 

— — - — ^ — — — — — ^ — — — —  etc. 

Here  again  there  is  periodicity.  This  time  the  intervals 
are  quite  within  the  limits  of  immediate  experience;  but, 
because  there  is  given  in  them  no  phenomenon  that  would 
cause  them  to  be  grouped,  they  pass  unnoticed  by  conscious- 
ness. Ordinarily  they  present,  just  as  the  ticking  of  the 
clock  presents,  periodicity  and  nothing  more.  If  the  at- 
tention is  directed  to  them,  they  can  be  counted;  but  the 
process  is  fatiguing.  In  consequence,  consciousness  thrusts 
them  from  the  center  of  attention.  When  forced  to  re- 
gard them,  it  does  its  best  to  relieve  the  monotony  by  in- 
troducing into  every  other  beat  an  increase  of  intensity 
which  the  beat  itself  does  not  possess.  In  fact,  this  sub- 
jective differentiation  is  something  more  than  a  mere  desire 


RHYTHM   DEFINED  97 

to  escape  monotony.  Perhaps  its  explanation  is  to  be  found 
in  the  periodic  character  of  attention  itself.^ 

If  I  take  any  two  sounds  of  fixed  intensity  and  tone- 
color  and  of  the  lengths  n  ( — )  and  m  (-)  such  that  they  shall 
fall  within  the  span  of  attention,  I  can  arrange  them  in  any 
number  of  successions;   for  instance, 

etc. 

etc. 

etc. 

etc. 

As  long  as  there  is  in  these  sounds  themselves  nothing  to 
catch  the  attention  and  thus  force  it  to  group  them,  they 
are  merely  periodic  occurrences.  As  soon,  however,  as  one 
sound  presents  itself  in  such  a  manner  as  to  force  a  grouping, 
so  that  it  is  a  case  of  longer  sounds  marked  off  by  shorter, 
or  of  shorter  marked  off  by  a  longer,  a  fixed  pattern  is  set  up 
and  rhythm  is  established.  If  there  be  in  the  series  itself 
nothing  upon  which  the  attention  can  fix  as  a  means  of 
grouping,  subjectively  it  will  supply  a  beat  which  it  uses  to 
this  end.  This  subjective  grouping  will  be  determined  by 
the  rate  at  which  the  components  of  the  series  appear,  each 
hearer  fixing  upon  a  group  length  corresponding  as  nearly 
as  possible  to  his  individual  unit  of  time  or  to  some  multiple 
thereof. 

Notice  that  in  the  diagram  just  given  two  phenomena  are 
concerned,  the  length  n  and  the  length  m.  Exactly  the  same 
would  be  true  if  either  n  or  m  were  silences.  For,  of  course, 
in  this  sense  silence  is  just  as  much  a  phenomenon  as  is 
sound,  since  it,  too,  represents  an  occurrence.     Every  time 

^  Ladd:    "Psychology:    Descriptive  and  Explanatory,"  71  ff. 
J.  P.  Hylan:    "The  Fluctuation  of  Attention,"  Psychological  Review 
pubUcation,  Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  2,  No.  5  (Lancaster,  Pa.). 


98   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

two  phenomena  form  a  series,  they  do  not  necessarily  estab- 
lish a  rhythm ;  but,  in  order  that  there  may  be  rhythm  at  all, 
there  must  be  at  least  two  phenomena.  The  number  of 
phenomena  that  may  enter  into  a  composite  rhythm  is  quite 
indefinite.  At  this  moment  I  can  think  of  at  least  half  a 
dozen;  but  as  many  more  might  readily  be  added,  I  imagine. 
What  is  necessary  is  that  the  material  be  presented  to  con- 
sciousness in  such  a  way  as  to  be  recognizable  as  forming  a 
pattern.  Of  course,  the  perception  of  the  pattern  depends 
upon  the  active  or  the  passive  attitude  of  the  subject  and  upon 
important  variations  peculiar  to  individual  subjects.  For 
instance,  when  the  succession  falls  below  a  certain  rate,  the 
elements  appear  to  be  isolated,  and  no  impression  of  rhythm 
arises;  when  the  succession  is  above  a  certain  rate,  the 
impression  of  rhythm  is  either  destroyed  altogether  or 
transformed  from  the  original  pattern  by  the  substitution 
of  either  a  different  grouping  or  of  a  composite  grouping.^ 
Suppose  I  make  three  strokes  with  a  hammer  in  equal  suc- 
cession and  at  such  a  fixed  rate  as  to  be  favorable  for  group- 
ing, —  thus,  .  .  .  Regarding  the  hammer  stroke  as  a  phe- 
nomenon and  silence  as  another  phenomenon,  I  have  here  a 
rhythmic  pattern,  because  the  three  strokes  are  recognizable 
as  grouped.  Now,  just  as  long  as  I  impose  them  upon  silence 
in  such  a  way  that  they  continue  to  appear  as  grouped,  I  have 
rhythm.  As  these  three  strokes  stand  in  isolation,  their 
rhythm  is  only  rudimentary;  but  it  is  rhythm,  nevertheless; 
and  from  exactly  such  rhythmic  groups  as  this  the  great  works 
of  tonal  art  are  built  up.  Not  a  page  of  Beethoven  can  be 
turned  without  one's  finding  there  as  many  illustrations  as 
heart  could  desire,  though  the  opening  theme  of  the  "  Eroica  " 
is  in  its  simplicity  the  most  striking  example. 

1  Macdougall:  "The  Structure  of  Simple  Rhythm  Forms,"  p.  321 
and  following.  Psychological  Review,  Series  of  Monograph  Supple- 
ments, Vol.  IV.  (Whole  No.  17),  Jan.,  1903. 


RHYTHM   DEFINED  99 

Of  course,  a  single  rhythmic  pattern  can  be  repeated 
indefinitely,  as  any  one  familiar  with  the  music  of  the  less 
advanced  savage  tribes  can  testify;  but  for  more  advanced 
art  numerous  rhythmic  patterns  are  readily  discoverable  in 
every  composition.  Usually  a  pattern  is  repeated;  but 
repetition  is  not  invariably  necessary  —  Macdougall  and 
others  to  the  contrary  ^  —  in  order  for  a  succession  to 
establish  itself  in  consciousness  as  a  rhythm,  though  nearly 
always  it  is  only  upon  repetition  that  it  is  recognized  as 
forming  a  distinct  pattern  and  that  the  impression  of 
movement  is  set  up.  Notice,  too,  that  I  have  said  noth- 
ing about  the  relation  to  each  other  of  the  several  units  of 
length  within  the  rhythmic  group.  Theoretically  the  time 
lengths  of  the  sounds  and  the  silences  in  music  maintain  a 
simple  ratio  to  one  another;  but  it  is  quite  possible  to  have 
a  rhythm  in  such  a  succession  as  the  following,  in  which  the 
first  and  the  last  units  are  each  five  times  longer  than  the 
middle  unit :  2 

;  or  as     J .   J   |  ;  or  as   |  J .   J    J   j 

As  soon  as  I  begin  to  repeat  any  one  of  these  patterns,  even 
where  the  intermediate  pauses  are  not  equal,  it  is  still  recog- 
nized as  a  pattern  and  as  a  rhythm,  although,  if  I  make  my 
pause  too  short,  the  pattern  is  likely  to  be  broken  down.^ 
If  not  the  pause,  then  something  else  must  occur  to  make  the 
grouping  evident.  It  should  be  clear,  therefore,  that  it  is 
perfectly  possible  to  have  rhythm  without  having  among  the 
time-lengths  of  the  group  any  such  ratio  as  is  conventionally 
assumed  in  musical  notation,  where  the  time-lengths  of  the 

1  Macdougall:   "Structure  of  Simple  Rhythm  Forms,"  p.  318. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  367  and  following. 

Wallin:   "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  33. 
'  Macdougall:  Ibid.,  p.  321,  c. 


100     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

notes  are  to  each  other  as  in  the  series  2:4:8:16:32:64.^ 
To  illustrate  again,  I  can  arrange  a  pattern  in  which  the 
first  unit  has  a  length  of  three,  the  second  of  two,  and  the 
last  of  seven.     This  pattern  I  can  repeat  indefinitely. 

,  ,  ,  etc. 

However,  before  I  can  build  out  of  any  such  rhythmic 
pattern  or  patterns  an  artistic  whole,  it  is  essential  that  they 
be  capable  of  being  fitted  into  some  general  scheme  which  is 
felt  to  maintain  throughout  the  composition.  It  is  here 
that  the  time  element  becomes  a  prime  factor  in  establishing 
the  feeling  of  artistic  unity  or  completeness.  There  must 
always  be  some  phenomenon,  no  matter  what,  to  recur  with 
sufficient  frequency  and  regularity  to  set  up  a  measured 
interval  of  time  into  which  the  given  rhythm  or  rhythms 
can  be  fitted,  and  by  means  of  which  they  can  be  felt  as 
related  to  one  another.  This  phenomenon,  or  what  is  ac- 
cepted as  this  phenomenon,  does  not  itself  establish  a  rhythm, 
but  appears  only  as  a  periodic  recurrence,  the  point  of  division 
marking  the  boundaries  of  the  time-unit  adopted  as  the 
standard  of  measurement  from  a  given  composition.  It  is 
here  that  Guest,  Verrier,  and  many  others  have  allowed 
themselves  to  be  misled.  They  have  mistaken  stress, 
accent,  or  whatever  it  may  be  called,  for  rhythm,  when 
accent  is  only  one  of  several  phenomena  which  may  mark 
the  recurrence  of  the  time-intervals,  though  it  is,  indeed,  the 
most  usual  method  of  marking  them.  The  sign  of  division, 
whatever  it  may  be,  is  essential  to  both  verse  and  music; 
but  the  time-division  itself  is  of  equal  importance,  as,  too, 
are  the  rhythmic  units.  The  content  of  these  rhythmic 
units  is,  I  believe,  the  most  prominent  feature  of  prose, 
verse,  and  music.     It  is  this  which  is  immediately  perceived, 

1  Wallin:  "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  Studies  from  the 
Yale  Psychological  Laboratory,  Vol.  IX.,  1901,  p.  33. 


RHYTHM   DEFINED  101 

and  through  which  both  the  length  of  the  time-unit  and  the 
phenomenon  which  marks  that  length  are  made  apparent. 
Theoretically  neither  the  time-unit  nor  the  recurrence  of  the 
sign  which  marks  its  boundaries  ought  to  vary;  but,  as  a 
general  thing,  the  content  of  the  time-interval  —  that  is, 
the  rhythm  —  is  changing  constantly,  and  upon  its  skillful 
variation  rests  much  of  the  beauty  of  prose,  verse,  and  music. 
Rhythm,  then,  I  define  as  constituted  by  the  consecutive  occur^ 
rence  of  phenomena  which  are  perceived  as  forming  a  succession 
of  distinct,  related  patterns  in  time.  From  the  point  of  view 
of  the  psychologist  the  phenomena  ate  sound  (in  which  each 
of  its  four  characteristics  is  regarded  as  separate  phenomenon) 
and  silence;  from  that  of  the  psychologist  they  are  pecul- 
iarly felt  motor  reactions.  Rhythm  may  or  may  not  be 
periodic  in  character;  periodicity  of  recurrence  may  under 
certain  conditions  present  a  rhythm;  and  even  the  same 
series  may  be  heard  as  different  rhythms;  ^  but,  to  be  of 
value  in  music  or  in  verse,  rhythm  must  be  felt  in  relation 
to  some  comparatively  fixed  unit  of  time,  which  unit  the 
rhythm  itself  assists  in  determining. 

"Perhaps  the  only  undisputed  characteristic  of  rhythm  is  the 
impression  of  regularity  which  it  occasions.  Some  hold  that  this 
impression  arises  from  the  regular  recurrence,  in  time,  of  certain 
features  of  the  rhythmic  series;  others  claim  that  the  regularity 
resides  in  the  structure  of  the  elements  composing  the  series;  but 
in  either  case  some  regularity  is  admitted.  A  rhythm  lacking 
regularity  in  its  structure  and  failing  in  the  regular  repetition  of 
its  elements  would  be  no  rhythm."  ^ 

Let  us  now  examine  the  several  types  of  phenomena  which 
enter  into  the  formation  of  temporal  rhythm,  with  a  view  to 

1  R.  S.  Woodworth:  Journal  of  Philosophy,  Psychology  and  Scientific 
Methods,  IV.,  17  (1907). 

2  Warner  Brown:  Psychological  Review,  Vol.  XVIII.,  No.  5,  Sept., 
1911,  p.  336. 


8TATc  TLAG!:ER'8  CUltQfe 
SAiiTA  BAHBARA,CALJFOBHlA 

/...^.|in«...^.»»^»"»« 


102      THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

determining  therefrom,  first,  to  what  extent  any  one  feature 
of  the  rhythmic  series  may  be  looked  upon  as  of  regular 
recurrence,  and,  second,  to  what  extent  the  structure  of  the 
elements  composing  the  series  may  be  lacking  in  regularity 
and  still  be  considered  as  constituting  a  rhythm. 


CHAPTER  X 

DURATION 

Have  you  ever  gone  into  a  room  in  which  nothing  could  be 
heard  except  the  unvarying  hum  of  machinery?  Have  you 
ever  been  out  on  the  ice  at  night  miles  and  miles  away  from 
anything  which  could  cause  the  slightest  sound,  when  even 
the  wind  was  asleep?  If  you  have,  then,  perhaps,  you  are  pre- 
pared to  imagine  what  an  eternity  of  either  sound  or  silence 
would  be  like.  Sound  implies  such  a  stimulation  of  the 
nerves  of  the  ear  as  can  produce  a  reaction  in  the  mind  of  the 
hearer;  silence,  the  absence  of  such  stimulation.  Stimula- 
tion that  is  perfectly  continuous  and  uniform  soon  ceases 
to  attract  attention  to  itself.  It  passes  unnoticed.  Sound 
compels  attention  only  when  some  one  of  its  characteristics, 
or  perhaps  even  more  of  them,  are  varying,  or  when  there  is 
alternation  of  sound  and  silence.  If  the  tone-color,  the 
pitch,  and  the  intensity  of  a  sound  are  kept  constant,  it  can 
be  measured  only  by  breaking,  no  matter  how  briefly,  the 
continuum  of  sound.  The  duration  of  the  sound  becomes 
limited  by  silence;  the  duration  of  silence  is  limited  by  sound. 
Each  breaks  the  other. ^  It  is  incomparably  more  conven- 
ient, however,  to  measure  with  reference  to  sound  than  to 
silence.  Psychologists,  therefore,  always  adopt  some  con- 
venient time-length  as  the  standard  of  measurement  when 
they  are  presenting  mechanically  produced  sounds  for  the 
introspection  of  those  upon  whom  they  are  experimenting 

*  Squire  {American  Journal  of  Psychology,  549,  XII.,  501,  1901)  and! 
Macdougall  {Psychological  Review,  IX.,  461,  1902)  appear  to  agree  with; 
me  as  to  the  possibility  of  rhythm  when  only  length  of  sound  is  involved- 

103 


104     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

Of  course,  this  sound-length  may  be  changed  as  frequently 
as  is  convenient  during  an  experiment;  but  each  judgment  as 
to  the  length  of  a  sound  or  of  a  silence  must  be  in  reference 
to  some  standard  of  sound-length.  Even  in  the  laboratory, 
under  the  favorable  conditions  for  judgment  made  possible 
by  the  control  of  both  objective  and  subjective  factors  and 
when  attention  is  centered  upon  just  one  property  of  sounds 
already  simplified  to  the  last  degree,  it  is  quite  astonishing 
what  an  amount  of  inaccuracy  still  persists  in  our  j  udgments 
of  comparative  time-lengths.  We  both  overestimate  and 
underestimate.  ^  Likewise  we  accept  as  equal  time  intervals 
which  are  unequal  (sometimes  by  almost  as  much  as  fifty 
per  cent),  particularly  where  it  is  a  case  of  comparing  length 
of  sound  with  length  of  silence.^  Even  when  the  number 
of  sounds  to  be  compared  is  limited  to  successions  of  two  or 
three  in  a  group,  not  only  their  relative  lengths,  the  order  of 
their  arrangement,  the  silences  which  separate  them,  and  the 
frequency  with  which  the  silences  occur,  but  also  the  rate 
of  speed  at  which  they  are  presented  to  the  observer  make 
a  very  marked  difference  in  the  perception  of  them,  while 
to  intensify  one  of  the  sounds  produces  in  the  hearer  a  still 
greater  illusion  as  to  both  the  duration  of  the  sound  itself 
and  the  duration  of  the  sounds  and  silences  adjacent  to  it.^ 

1  Hall  and  Jastrow:   "Studies  in  Rhythm,"  Mind,  XL,  No.  41,  Jan., 
1886,  pp.  61-62. 

V.  Benussi:    "Psychologie  d.  Zeitauffassung,"  p.  419  (Heidelberg, 
1913). 

2  Ibid.,  p.  486. 

Hall  and  Jastrow:   Ibid. 

Wallin:    "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  133. 

3  Bolton:  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  VI.,  222  (1894). 
Ettlinger:    Zeitschrifl  fiir  Fsijchologie,  XXII.,  132-133  (1900). 
Kafka:  "tJber  das  Ansteigen  der  Tonerregung,"  Psycho.  Studien,  II., 

256-292   (1907). 

Meumann:  Philosophische  Studien,  IX.,  and  X. 

Miner:    Monograph  Supplements  to  Psychological  Review,  Vol.  V., 


DURATION  105 

If  this  takes  place  when  duration,  and  duration  alone,  is 
involved  and  when  attention  is  doing  its  best  to  make  accu- 
rate judgments,  the  amount  of  aberration  attendant  upon 
judgment  when  not  only  variety  of  pitch,  of  tone-color,  and 
of  intensity,  but  also  intellectual  content  are  present  to 
complicate  matters  must  be  seen  at  once  to  be  extreme. 

Now,  reversing  the  situation,  let  the  former  subject  become 
the  producer  of  sounds  the  duration  of  which  he  feels  to  be 
either  equal  to  each  other  or  to  the  duration  of  certain 
silences,  or  which  he  feels  to  bear  fixed  ratios  to  each  other 
or  to  the  duration  of  certain  silences.  Even  when  he  calls 
to  his  aid  marching,  beating  time,  or  any  other  mode  of 
measurement  not  external  to  himself,  he  is  still  no  more 
able  to  produce  them  accurately  than  he  was  to  perceive 
them   accurately   when    they   were    objectively   produced.^ 

No.  4  (1903).  Lights  were  used  instead  of  sounds.  For  us,  therefore, 
the  results  are  more  suggestive  than  conclusive. 

Macdougall:   "The  Structure  of  Simple  Rhythm  Forms." 

Schumann:  Zeitschrift  fiir  Psychologie,  XVIII.,  30-36  (1898). 

Wallin:  "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and  Time,"  Psycho- 
logical Review,  March,  1911,  XVIII.,  No.  2,  and  May,  1911,  Vol. 
XVIII.,  No.  3. 

Woodrow:  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  pp.  30-52,  Columbia 
University  Contributions  to  Philosophy  and  Psychology,  XVIII.,  No.  1, 
June,  1909  (Science  Press,  New  York). 

1  Warner  Brown:    "Time  in  English  Verse  Rhythm,"  p.  7  (c). 

Johnson:  "Researches  in  Practice  and  Habit." 

Martius:   Philoso.  Studien,  1891,  VI.,  196. 

Meumann:    Philoso.  Studien,  1894,  X.,  302. 

T.  V.  Moore:  "A  Study  in  Reaction  Time  and  Movement,"  Psy- 
chological Review  publication,  Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  VI., 
No.  24  (Lancaster,  Pa.). 

Scripture:   "The  New  Psychology,"  p.  125. 

Smith:  Philoso.  Studien,  1900,  XVI.,  282. 

Wallin:   "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  27. 

R.  S.  Woodworth:  "The  Accuracy  of  Voluntary  Movement,"  Psy- 
chological Review  publication.  Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  III., 
No.  III.   (Lancaster,  Pa.). 


106     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

When  he  adds  variety  of  pitch  and  tone-color,  as  well  as 
thought  content,  to  his  sounds,  the  possibility  of  his  securing 
even  an  approximation  to  mathematical  precision  as  regards 
time-length  is  not  very  great.  However  badly  he  may  be 
deceiving  himself  in  respect  to  his  performance,  the  fact 
remains  that  he  is  satisfied  with  it,  that  he  believes  himself  to 
have  judged  accurately,  and  that  others,  hearing  the  sounds, 
believe  him  to  be  producing  them  accurately  —  all  of  which 
goes  to  show  what  a  decidedly  faulty  piece  of  mechanism  the 
human  chronometer  really  is.  Even  when  it  is  properly  oiled, 
when  it  is  on  the  level,  and  when  conditions  of  temperature 
and  humidity  are  just  what  they  ought  to  be,  it  can  not  be 
got  to  run  on  time,  it  will  not  tick  with  the  metronome. 
Indeed,  it  abhors  absolute  regularity,  and  will  judge  of  the 
passage  of  time  only  in  reference  to  the  intensity  of  its  own 
experiences.  Nevertheless,  it  is  equally  opposed  to  running 
without  some  show  of  accuracy,  and  is  constantly  priding 
itself  upon  being  just  to  the  second.  It  wills  to  be  exact. 
It  demands  exactness  of  itself.  Yet  it  is  so  put  together  that 
it  can  not  be  exact,  and  that  it  is  quite  complacent  about 
its  own  performance  so  long  as  appearances  are  maintained. 
Every  sound  must  possess  some  length.  Imaginary  points 
and  imaginary  lines  with  no  dimension  except  length  may  be 
conceivable;  but  sound  without  length  is  not  even  conceiv- 
able. Various  sounds  are  capable  of  continuation  for  vary- 
ing lengths  of  time.  That  a  sound  should  be  available  for 
artistic  purposes,  the  length  of  time  during  which  it  may  be 
made  to  continue  must  be  under  control.  In  music,  for 
instance,  the  sounds  produced  by  any  instrument  are  of 
perfectly  indefinite  duration  except  as  they  are  incited  and 
checked  by  the  performer.  The  mobility  of  sound  makes 
possible  its  employment  as  a  source  of  aesthetic  enjoyment. 
The  sounds  from  some  instruments  are  more  easily  controlled 
than  the  sounds  from  others;   and  the  artistic  value  of  any 


DURATION  107 

instrument  is  in  a  large  measure  determined  by  the  degree 
of  flexibility  with  which  it  yields  itself  to  the  will  of  the 
performer.  A  skillful  artist,  however,  as  the  result  of 
practice  or  otherwise,  can  get  from  his  instrument  an  amount 
of  response  simply  impossible  to  the  man  unfamiliar  with 
its  mechanism.  Every  one  is  so  habituated  to  the  use  of  the 
voice  that  speech  sounds  are  under  his  control  to  a  marvelous 
degree.  Normally  by  the  time  a  child  has  reached  the 
age  of  eight  or  ten,  one  sound  is  as  easy  of  production  for 
him  as  another;  and  he  produces  with  equal  fluency  all  the 
sounds  of  his  language.  Indeed,  he  does  not  have  to  give 
the  slightest  thought  to  their  production. 

As  the  sound-lengths  involved  in  music  are  so  closely 
analogous  in  every  particular  to  the  sound-lengths  of  the 
vowels,  and  as  these  have  been  investigated,  whereas  the 
sound  lengths  of  the  other  tones  have  not  received  very 
careful  consideration,  before  passing  to  the  discussion  of  the 
former,  I  shall  present  what  is  known  about  the  latter.^ 

Although  it  would  seem  that  Sweet  ^  is  right  in  asserting 
the  only  division  actually  made  in  language  to  be  that  into 
breath  groups  governed  by  the  pause  and  the  expiration 
interval,  the  experiments  performed  by  J.  E.  Wallace  Wallin' 
must  occasion  us  a  readjustment  of  opinion.  The  testimony 
of  the  ear  is  not  to  be  relied  upon  where  the  findings  of  science 
are  to  the  contrary.     Wallin's  records  were  made  with  a 

*  I  regret  that  I  have  been  unable  to  see  Meyer's  records  in  "  Skrifter 
Kongl.  Humanistiska  Vetenskaps-Samfundet  Upsala,"  VIII.,  1903.  He 
has  measured  the  EngUsh  vowel  sounds  and  some  of  the  consonants,  his 
records  including  vowels,  stressed  and  unstressed,  in  initial,  medial, 
and  terminal  positions  for  words  of  different  lengths.  Dr.  Warner 
Brown  says  ("Time  in  EngUsh  Verse  Rhythm,"  p.  24)  that  the  records 
are  clear  and  apparently  acciu-ate  to  at  least  one-hundredth  of  a  second. 

*  Sweet:    "Primer  of  Phonetics,"  p.  42. 

*  "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  pp.  23-32.  Studies  from 
Yale  Psychological  Laboratory,  Vol.  IX.,  1901. 


108     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

Lioret  phonograph  and  were  later  reproduced  upon  an  Edison. 
His  measurements,  taken  from  the  readings  of  men  of  pro- 
fessed hterary  tastes,  were  made  with  painstaking  exactness. 

"The  speed  of  the  phonograph  was  reduced  until  a  group  of 
rapidly  recurrent  sounds,  which  had  previously  appeared  as  a 
homogeneity,  was  spht  up  into  discrete  elements  of  sound  sepa- 
rated by  gaps.  .  .  .  The  degree  of  reduction  was  determined, 
not  by  the  threshold  of  audibihty,  but  by  the  threshold  of  articu- 
labiUty,  which  is  higher  than  the  former.  .  .  .  Physically,  the 
sounds  represent  vibrations  of  given  lengths,  amphtudes  and 
periods.  The  gaps  or  silences  probably  correspond  in  some  cases 
to  very  weak  vibrations  (gUdes).  Not  infrequently,  however, 
they  are  physically  interpretable  as  absence  of  vibrations.  .  .  . 
Physiologically,  the  sounds  and  sUences  are  interpretable  as  changes 
in  the  condition  of  the  vocal  organs." 

The  following  is  a  typical  example,  selected  because  of 
the  frequent  repetition  of  the  same  vowel.  The  dots  over 
the  words  represent  stresses  in  which  loudness  is  slightly 
more  important  than  duration  and  pitch.  "The  silences 
are  indicated  by  dashes  ( — ).  The  numeral  below  the 
dash  indicates  the  duration  of  the  silence  in  units  of  con- 
tacts; numerals  above  the  syllables  indicate  the  duration 
of  the  syllable  to  which  they  pertain."  The  recording  speed 
was  one  hundred  revolutions  per  minute;  and  the  unit  of 
measurement,  one  contact  every  ^V  of  a  second. 

15         .        15       .   11  .       25 

352         5         234  9 

My  bed  —  is  —  like  —  a  —  little  —  boat;  — 
4        2  4       3  5  15 

.15        .  18     .       14     .         19     .     48 

5  5  86396        11 

Nurse  —  puts  —  me  in  —  and  I  em  —  bark;  — 
8  5  4  3  33 


DURATION 


109 


22        .        23        .  19  .     29 

2  76668  48 

She  —  girds  —  me  —  in  —  my  —  sail  —  ors  —  coat  — 
?  6  3        4  6  2  5  17 


21 

And  —  starts  —  me  —  in 
?  ?  ? 


14 

the 


dark. 


(Robert  L.  Stevenson.) 


Let  me  present  in  tabulated  form  the  time-lengths  of  a 
number  of  syllables  containing  the  same  vowels. 


3 

6 

5 

9 

8 

9 

my 

my 

like 

/ 

0 

coat 

boat 

2 

3 

6 

6 

2 

8 

is 

Kt 

in 

m 

a 

a 

sail 

8 

6 

21 

14 

2 

5 

7 

me 

me 

me 

the 

she 

u 

nwrse 

girds 

5 

6 

bed 

em 

From  experiments  such  as  this  Wallin  concludes : 

(1)  "The  absolute  duration  of  any  syllable  is  variable. 

(2)  "The  average  emphatic  syllable  is  invariably  longer  than 
the  average  unemphatic,"  the  average  long  syllable  being  one  and 
three-fourths  times  as  long  as  the  average  short  syllable. 

(3)  "The  ratio  sustained  between  the  average  unemphatic 
and  emphatic  syllable  varies  with  the  different  subjects;"  and  for 
English  all  the  emphatic  syllables  are  at  least  half  as  long  again 
as  the  average  unemphatic. 

(4)  "The  ratios  exsisting  between  individual  emphatic  or 
unemphatic  syllables  of  the  same  or  of  different  records,  are  neither 
invariable,  nor  are  they  the  rates  of  simple  proportion.  .  .  .  Not 


110    THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

infrequently  the  rate  is  reversed,  so  that  the  sporadic  unemphatic 
syllables  may  be  longer  than  the  average  of  the  emphatic  syllables. 
.  .  .  These  facts  incontestably  refute  the  theory  of  'simple  pro- 
portion.' 

(5)  "The  long  and  short  syllables  are  about  equal  in  regularity," 
the  average  long  syllable  being  one  and  six-tenths  more  irregular 
than  the  short. 

(6)  "The  ratio  between  the  number  of  emphatic  and  unem- 
phatic syllables"  is  as  1.2  : 1,  which  is  smaller  than  the  total 
duration  of  the  same. 

Wallin  continues :  ^ 

"The  most  general  deduction  to  be  made  from  this  series  of 
measurements  is  the  disparity  in  the  time-span  of  so-called  long 
syllables.  It  has  been  shown  that  the  temporal  distinction  is 
true  to  fact. 

"All  speech  is  quantitative;  and  the  distinction,  popularly  and 
confidently  posited,  between  quantitative  and  non-quantitative 
verse  is  grounded  upon  fallacious  assumptions.  The  question  of 
the  quantitative  character  of  poetry  or  prose,  is  closed.  The 
only  crux  of  contention  that  remains  affects  the  character  of  the 
laws  governing  the  temporal  relation  of  the  components  of  lan- 
guage.    The  question  contains  several  phases. 

"The  first  determination  has  settled  the  fact  that  speech  as  a 
phenomenal  occurrence  is  conditioned  on  the  time-intuition  of 
sensibiUty. 

"The  second  question  has  already  been  settled,  namely,  that 
the  strong  syllable  is  temporally  longer  than  the  weak. 

"The  third  question  is  partly  closed.  It  has  been  shown  that 
for  Enghsh,  Swedish,  and  Persian  the  ratio  between  the  individual 
long  and  weak  syllables  is  never  constant.  The  general  character 
of  the  ratio  was  for  artistically  free  declamation  of  EngUsh  poetry, 
in  the  proportion  of  1:1.7;  .  .  .  1:1.5  for  English  prose." 

To  this  Warner  Brown  replies:   "Of  course,  no  one  in  his 
senses  ever  doubted  that  speech  is  quantitative,  but  there 
*  "  Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  pp.  32-33. 


DURATION  111 

has  been  grave  doubt  whether  quantity  in  speech  gives  rise 
to  the  rhythm  of  verse."  ^ 

Unfortunately,  not  a  few  men  of  undeniable  sanity  not 
only  have  doubted  that  English  speech  is  quantitative,  but 
do  doubt  so  at  present,  and  will  continue  in  this  state  of 
mind  even  in  spite  of  Dr.  Brown's  own  most  valuable  con- 
tribution to  our  knowledge  of  the  subject. 

"So  far  as  WaUin's  results  show  anything  at  all  on  this 
point,"  Dr.  Brown  goes  on  to  say,  "they  indicate  that 
quantity  is  not  responsible  for  the  phenomena  of  rhythm." 

Brown  followed  the  method  developed  by  Marey,^  Rous- 
selot,^  and  Meyer.*  Movements  of  the  Ups,  tongue,  palate, 
and  larynx  were  recorded  by  direct  levers  writing  on  a  revolv- 
ing drum  or  by  electric  keys  connected  with  levers.  He 
measured  from  the  beginning  of  words  and  syllables,  counting 
as  a  prolongation  of  the  previous  sound  any  gap  which  oc- 
curred between  the  two  sounds.  He  made  no  attempt  to 
separate  the  last  syllable  and  the  pause  proper;  and  the 
final  syllable  does  not  enter  into  his  calculations.  For  non- 
sense verse  there  appears  to  be  a  fair  degree  of  equality  of 
duration  in  the  length  of  the  feet;  but  even  in  the  most 
simple  and  regular  cases  of  actual  verse  the  irregularity  in 
the  length  of  the  syllables  is  beyond  question  (Brown, 
Tables  V-XII),  though  there  is  a  decided  tendency  toward 
approximate  sameness  in  the  duration  of  the  feet. 

The  following  (Brown,  Table  XH)  is  of  unusual  irregu- 
larity. It  represents  averages  of  ten  readings  by  the  same 
subject.  The  time-length  of  each  syllable  is  written  below 
it,  and  below  that  the  mean  variation  per  cent.  The 
accents  are  my  own  and  are  not  a  part  of  the  original  table. 

»  "Time  in  English  Verse  Rhythm,"  p.  35. 

*  Marey:    "La  m^thode  graphique,"  p.  309. 

'  Rousselot:  La  Parole,  N.  S.,  I.,  1,  401,  769  (1899). 

*  Meyer:  Die  neueren  Sprachen,  VI.,  123  (1899). 


112     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

Verse 


Al  most 

u   pon 

the  ^ 

wes      tern 

wave 

22  34 

11  26 

11 

28    15 

48 

195 

9        8 

.8 

13     18 

19 

20           7 

9.6 

Res 

ted 

the 

broad 

bright 

sun 

28 

20 

13 

37 

20 

89 

22 

19 

15 

9.5 

19 

6.5 

207 

When 

that 

strange 

i      shape  drove 

sud  den 

ly 

21 

16 

45 

46 

28 

28   11 

36  194 

9 

17 

12 

12 

8.6 

8       13 

21 

. 

Pause 

Be 

twixt 

)    us 

and 

the 

sun 

17 

28 

27 

27 

12 

40   99 

250 

8.4 

8.4 

9.6 

14 

16 

6.7 

I  add  for  convenience  in  comparison  the  time-lengths  of 
a  number  of  the  syllables  in  which  the  same  vowel  occurs. 


11 

89   28    27    40 

u 

sun      sud      us        sun 

34 

28 

mo 

drove 

26 

pon 

11    12    13    17 

e       the   the   the   be 

28    28    11    20 

21 

e   res   wes   den   ted 

when 

DURATION  113 


48  45  46 

a    wave      strange  shape 


22 

37 

a 

a\ 

broad 

16 

27 

a 

that 

and 

Still  more  conclusive  evidence  is  presented  by  this  record 
of  ''The  Bells,"  in  obtaining  the  figures  for  which,  says 
Brown,  ten  readings  by  the  same  person  were  averaged. 
Because  I  wish  to  show  from  this  the  variability  to  which  the 
same  syllable  is  subject,  I  produce  here  only  those  Unes  con- 
taining the  words  time  and  bells.     (See  Table  XXXIV,  p.  68.) 

78       79     110 
Keeping  time,  time,  time 

98 
To  the  paean  of  the  bells  —  ' 

125 
Of  the  beUs: 

78       78     109 
Keeping  time,  time,  time, 

103 
To  the  throbbing  of  the  bells 

77       79       75      113 
Of  the  bells,  bells,  bells,  bells. 

79      74      112 
BeUs,  bells,  bells. 


114    THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

R.  H.  Stetson^  gives  the  following  measurements  from 
the  one  original  graphophone  record  which  he  produces  in 
criticism  of  Lanier's  musical  interpretation  of  verse. 

I  saw       a      ship  a  sail  ing 

50     16    20    13    9     16    32    23      132 

A  sailing     on      the  sea 

10    16  45        22        8      15    49        68 

And     it  was        full  of        pretty      things 

8    6  20    6    6    27    37     12    8    7    20      12    41         34 

For  baby  and  for  me. 

14       9      27       37       18    20     14    8      46 

Totals  of  the  feet: 

-/66/60/187 

26/45/45/187 

14/59/49/47/75 

23/64/60/46— 

9     10        32  27 

a    a    a  sail  baby 

8       49      46 
e     the     sea   .  me 

20  20  41 

i         ship         it       things 

8  18 

a        and      and 

14  14 

0        for         for 

1  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme/'  p.  463,  Psych.  Review,  Harvard  Psy. 
Studies,  1903. 


DURATION  115 

Although  I  entertain  very  serious  doubts  as  to  the  vaUdity 
of  the  results  obtained  through  experiments  in  which  the 
measuring  of  time-intervals  is  by  beats  of  the  finger  accom- 
panying the  reading  of  verse,  I  can  offer  with  due  reserve 
the  findings  of  Briicke^  and  of  Hurst  and  McKay .^  Miyake' 
has  proved  that  in  experiments  of  this  type  there  are  de- 
cided discrepancies  between  the  moment  of  occurrence  of 
the  beat  of  the  finger  and  the  accent  given  by  the  voice. 
The  accuracy  of  the  results  obtained  by  Hurst  and  McKay 
are  further  prejudiced  because  the  subjects  were  taught  to 
read  and  to  beat  as  regularly  as  possible  without  neglect  of 
the  rhythm.  Even  after  that  all  large  variations  were  de- 
liberately discarded.  But  one  example  is  given  in  illustration 
of  their  experiments,  though  the  authors  report  that  a  large 
number  were  made.  The  figures  represent  relative  per- 
centages expressed  in  hundredths  of  a  second. 

come  from  deep  glen  and  from  mountain  so    rock       y 
34       18      17    33.5     17     16      32     18     17.5  27.5    28.5 

Briicke's  work  was  done  at  a  much  earlier  date  (1871) 
when  apparatus  with  which  accurate  results  could  be  obtained 
was  impossible  of  construction;  yet  both  agree  in  declaring 
that  there  is  no  fixed  proportion  between  the  time-lengths 
of  the  syllables,  although  the  emphatic  syllables  are  longer 
than  the  unemphatic.  The  longer  sound  naturally  appears 
the  louder.  Dr.  Herbert  Woodrow  states,  after  numerous 
experiments  upon  thirteen  subjects.'* 

1  Briicke:  "  Physiologische  Grundlagen  der  neuhochdeutBchen 
Verskunst,"  Wien,   1871. 

^  Hurst  and  McKay:  "Experiments  on  the  Time  Relations  of  Po- 
etical Meters,"  Univ.  of  Toronto  Studies,  1899. 

'  Miyake:  "Studies  from  the  Yale  Psychological  Laboratory," 
X.,  1902. 

*  Herbert  Woodrow:  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  41, 
Columbia  Univ.  Contributions,  1909. 


116     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

If  the  investigations  of  Krai  and  Mares  ^  had  not  been 
confined  to  the  Bohemian  language,  they  would  be  of  the 
greatest  assistance  just  here;  still  I  do  not  feel  justified  in 
citing  their  conclusions,  although  I  believe  them  to  hold 
good  for  the  English  language. 

Judging,  then,  from  Briicke  and  from  Hurst  and  McKay, 
but  especially  from  the  measurements  of  both  Wallin  and 
Brown,  —  the  latter  using  different  methods  of  investigation 
and  certainly  to  some  extent  opposing  each  other,  —  to  my 
mind  several  facts  are  definitely  established: — (1)  No 
vowel  sound  or  any  syllable  possesses  a  definite,  fixed  length. 
The  so-called  short  vowels  require  just  as  much  time  for  their 
pronunciation  as  is  required  by  the  so-called  long  vowels. 
(2)  The  consonants  accompanying  a  vowel  do  not  have  any 
appreciable  effect  upon  the  actual  duration  of  the  vowel, 
though  they  may  sometimes  affect  the  duration  of  the  syl- 
lable.2  The  strong  syllable  is  temporally  longer  than  the 
weak.  To  this  statement  may  be  added  the  testimony  of 
Verrier  ^  and  of  Herbert  Woodrow,  the  latter  to  the  effect 
that  all  his  subjects  frequently  remarked  upon  the  greater 
apparent  duration  of  the  louder  sounds  over  the  weaker  * 
(although  in  this  instance  the  time-lengths  of  all  sounds  were 
kept  equal),  so  that  it  seems  correct  to  say  not  only  that  the 
strong  syllable  usually  is  longer  than  the  weak,  but  also  that, 
even  when  it  is  equal  to  the  weak,  the  strong  still  makes  the 

1  Krdl  and  Mares:  "Travdni  hliisek  a  slabik  die  objectivn^  miry," 
Usty  Filologike,  1893,  XX.,  257. 

2  The  addition  of  consonants  may  shorten  or  lengthen  a  syllable, 
according  to  Krdl  and  Mares,  but  never  proportionately  or  regularly 
{Listy  FilologicM,  1893,  IV.,  17).  I  have  been  unable  to  see  their  ac- 
count of  these  experiments.  Paul  Verrier 's  tabulation  of  sound  lengths 
(Vol.  I.,  par.  3,  p.  65)  seems  to  add  weight  to  their  conclusion. 

^  Paul  Verrier:  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  m^trique  anglaise," 
tom  3,  p.  68,  especially  (1). 

*  Herbert  Woodrow:    "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  33. 


DURATION  117 

impression  of  being  the  longer.  (3)  The  ratio  of  the  strong 
syllables  to  the  weak  is  never  constant  or  in  simple  pro- 
portion, although  for  any  one  particular  reading  the  ratio 
remains  fairly  well  fixed.  (4)  Faster  or  slower  rates  of 
reading  do  not  seem  to  have  any  uniform  influence  on  the 
ratio  of  the  syllables.  ^ 

Therefore,  any  theory  of  English  poetry  which  assumes 
for  the  syllables  either  equality  of  time-length  or  the  existence 
among  them  of  any  degree  of  simple  proportion  is  without 
foundation  in  fact.  Both  Professor  George  Saintsbury  as 
the  most  notable  exponent  of  the  classical  point  of  view  (in 
which  the  syllables  are  regarded  as  having  time-lengths  as 
one  to  two)  and  the  followers  of  the  musical  theory  of  verse 
(of  whom  Sidney  Lanier  is  the  most  celebrated)  must  seek 
elsewhere  for  justification  of  the  faith  that  is  in  them.  That 
the  syllables  bear  to  each  other  so  simple  a  relation  as  the 
ratio  of  one  to  two  is  out  of  all  question.  There  is  this  to  be 
said  in  favor  of  the  second  view :  A  Ithough  musical  notation 
would  lead  one  to  believe  that  the  sounds  of  music  are  in  simple 
proportion,  in  actual  performance  they  never  are.  As  I  am 
unable  to  find  any  elaborate  investigation  of  this  point,  the 
best  that  I  can  do  is  to  offer  the  results  obtained  by  Paul 
Verrier^  in  his  attempt  to  discover  the  time-lengths  of  the 
intervals  between  accents  in  both  verse  and  music.  Inci- 
dentally he  found  out  that  the  value  of  such  a  group  of  notes 
as  this  4  X  J^  when  sung  might  assume  the  ratios  1  :f  :^,  or 
that  frequently  there  might  exist  among  them  no  simple 
proportion  at  all.  When  the  general  averages  of  a  long  series 
of  notes  are  taken,  however,  a  fair  degree  of  regularity  does 
persist,  though  the  actual  length  of  the  note  as  written  is  only 

^  The  rates  of  reading  were  varied  constantly  in  the  experiments  of 
WalUn  and  of  Brown. 

*  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  metrique  anglaise,"  torn  3,  pp.  112- 
184;  and  " L'isochronisme  dans  le  vers  frangais"  (Paris,  1912),  p.  48. 


118    THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

more  or  less  carefully  observed  by  the  singer.  Sometimes 
in  artistic  singing  the  greatest  amount  of  freedom  is  allowed.^ 
Time-lengths  of  syllables  are  still  more  variable  in  verse  than 
in  song,  ''especially  as  there  are  nowhere  bars  to  indicate  the 
accents  or  the  division  into  feet,  and  the  reader  has  no  guide 
in  these  two  respects  except  his  own  instinct  for  poetic 
rhythm."  ^ 

To  my  mind  this  instinct  is,  after  all,  the  paramount  factor 
in  determining  the  time-lengths  of  both  syllables  and  pauses. 
Having  no  time-length  peculiar  to  themselves,  they  can 
be  used  by  the  interpreter  in  any  manner  dictated  by  his 
own  sense  of  rhythm.  If  his  feeling  for  time-lengths  is 
exact,  he  will  assign  to  the  syllables  and  the  pauses  time- 
lengths  of  far  simpler  proportions  than  if  his  feeling  is  fluctu- 
ating and  inaccurate.  Syllables  produced  without  the  least 
pretense  to  regularity  when  spoken  as  prose  can  be  sung  with 
all  the  exactness  of  time  proportions  possible  to  music. 

To  this  I  beg  to  add  the  testimony  of  my  own  experience, 
gained  through  eight  years  of  very  careful  study  of  music 
from  the  point  of  view  of  both  the  performer  and  the  com- 
poser. During  this  time  I  was  thrown  with  music  students 
of  all  grades  of  proficiency  and  with  many  of  the  great  artists. 
Although  I  may  be  mistaken,  I  do  not  believe  that  there 
would  be  among  the  advanced  students  of  music  many  to 
dissent  from  what  I  shall  say. 

In  the  playing  of  any  instrument,  it  is  impossible  to 
produce  tones  of  accurate  length.  The  most  perfect  legato 
still  shows  either  a  tiny  interval  between  any  two  sounds  or 
a  slight  overlapping  of  the  two.  These  even  a  Pachmann 
or  an  Ysaye  can  not  overcome  completely,  although,  as 

^  Paul  Verrier:  "Les  variations  temporelles  du  rhythm,"  Journal 
de  Psychologie  Norm,  el  Path.,  1913,  p.  18. 

*  Paul  Verrier:  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  mdtrique  anglaise," 
p.  181. 


DURATION  119 

far  as  our  ears  are  concerned,  the  fraction  is  less  than  negli- 
gible. In  vocal  music,  when  but  one  voice  is  singing,  there 
is,  of  course,  no  overlapping  of  tones;  but  the  break  between 
them  is  unavoidable,  in  spite  of  the  constant  effort  to  minimize 
it.  The  time  never  comes  when  pure  legato  and  accuracy 
of  attack  cease  to  require  attention.  They  are  not  sought, 
however,  with  a  view  to  reducing  music  to  so  strict  an  observ- 
ance of  time-lengths  as  is  kept  by  the  pianola  or  any  other 
mechanical  player,  although  neither  are  these  mathematically 
accurate.  If  attention  is  centered  upon  the  measuring  of 
durations,  even  the  Musical  Carpenter,  as  one  very  eminent 
pianist  was  called,  is  heard  to  take  all  sorts  of  liberties  with 
his  tones.  Practically  every  one  plays  the  second  beat  of 
waltz  time  considerably  shorter  than  the  first  or  the  third, 
and  the  third  shorter  than  the  first.  And  so  it  goes.  But 
particularly  in  singing  the  greatest  amount  of  freedom  is 
allowable.  It  is  only  when  the  discrepancy  is  so  great  that 
the  standard  of  measurement  ceases  to  be  felt  that  the  time 
sense  of  the  listener  is  offended.  To  what  extent  this 
discrepancy  can  be  pushed  for  music,  I  do  not  know;  but  it 
certainly  lies  much  beyond  the  belief  of  those  unfamiliar 
with  the  intricacies  of  musical  pedagogy.  Musical  notation 
is  almost  as  faulty  in  its  presentation  of  sound-lengths  as  the 
letters  of  the  alphabet  are  in  their  representation  of  sound- 
quality;  yet  for  practical  purposes  both  answer  very  well. 
Musical  notation  comes  almost  as  near  to  expressing  the  time- 
relations  of  verse  sounds  as  to  expressing  the  time-relations 
of  musical  sounds.  In  either  case  it  is  only  a  very  rough 
approximation;  yet  it  certainly  comes  far  nearer  to  express- 
ing these  relations  than  would  any  set  of  symbols  positing 
the  ratio  of  one  to  two  as  the  standard  of  measurement. 
In  both  music  and  verse  the  attempt  is  to  attain  a  ratio  of 
simple  proportions  among  the  time-lengths.  How  far  short 
of  attaining  that  ideal  accomplishment  falls,  I  hope  I  have 


120     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

made  apparent.  In  ordinary  prose  there  is  no  thought  of 
securing  a  ratio  of  any  proportions  whatsoever;  but,  under 
excitement  requiring  a  communciation  of  emotion  to  the 
sociological  group,  the  tendency  is  toward  greater  regularity. 
"The  general  character  of  the  ratio  ...  for  artistically  free 
declamation,"  as  I  have  already  cited  from  Wallin,  is  1:1.5 
for  English  prose;   1:1.7  for  English  verse. 

Since  both  sjdlables  and  silences  are  concerned  in  the 
building  up  of  rhythms,  it  next  behooves  me  to  state  what  is 
known  about  the  ratio  of  syllable  lengths  to  silence  lengths. 
Unfortunately,  Brown  neglected  the  silences  occurring  in  the 
specimens  of  verse  which  he  examined.  I  am  compelled, 
therefore,  to  rely  entirely  upon  Wallin  as  to  this  point.  By 
silences  he  means  those  gaps,  which  in  listening  to  a  slowly 
revolving  'phonograph  cylinder,  are  perceived  to  exist  between 
the  successive  syllables  of  phrase  groups.^  The  gaps  between 
phrase  groups,  or  expiration  intervals,  he  distinguishes  from 
the  other  type  by  calling  them  vacant  intervals,  or  pauses. 
His  conclusions,  offered  only  tentatively  because  of  the 
limited  number  of  silences  upon  which  his  determinations 
were  based,  are  these :  ^ 

(1)  The  silences  that  occur  between  the  points  of  maximum 
intensity  in  verse  rank  highest  in  order  of  length. 

(2)  The  silences  coming  before  the  points  of  maximum  inten- 
sity occupy  more  time  than  the  silences  which  come  after  these 
points. 

(3)  The  average  duration  of  the  silences  of  speech  is  about 
0.107  of  a  second. 

(4)  A.  The  ratio  of  quantity  of  silence  to  quantity  of  sound 
is  in  the  proportion  of  1:2.38.  "In  the  action  of  the  vocal  cords, 
the  period  of  work  is  nearly  two  and  a  half  times  longer  than  the 
period  of  rest." 

^  "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  35. 
2  Ibid.,  p.  37. 


DURATION  121 

B.  Conclusions:  (a)  "The  quantity  of  sound  of  expiration 
intervals  of  speech  is  nearly  two  and  a  half  times  greater  than 
the  quantity  of  silences. 

(b)  "The  average  emphatic  and  unem- 
phatic  syllables  of  speech  are  both  uniformly  longer  than  the  average 
silences." 

Of  course,  the  vacant  intervals  can  not  be  neglected  for 
prose  or  verse  or  music.  Wallin  measured  these  pauses, 
too,  for  prose  and  verse;  but,  because  he  considers  each 
line  in  verse  as  a  distinct  unit,  and  because  the  phrase 
ends  with  the  line  in  the  specimens  of  verse  he  examined, 
he  did  not  compare  the  pauses  with  the  length  of  the  syllables 
within  the  group.  I  doubt  that  tabulating  them  would 
yield  significant  results,  for  this  reason,  —  The  ear  judges 
vacant  intervals  of  time  to  be  longer  than  corresponding- 
intervals  of  sound;  so  the  length  of  the  pause  would  be  no 
criterion  of  the  length  of  time  the  speaker  believed  himself 
to  be  ofTering  in  compensation  for  incomplete  time-intervals 
occupied  by  sound,  or  of  the  time-interval  the  hearer  believed 
to  be  the  proper  compensation  for  the  incomplete  intervals 
of  sound. 

It  appears,  therefore,  that  in  music  and  in  verse  the 
interweaving  of  sounds  of  different  lengths  with  silences,  when 
these  sounds  and  silences  are  considered  apart  from  the 
other  characteristics  of  music  and  of  verse,  there  is  not  suffi- 
cient regularity  to  establish  either  a  basis  for  time-measure- 
ment or  a  pattern  definite  enough  to  be  considered  a  rhythm. 
Light  must  be  sought  elsewhere.  Can  the  differentiating 
characteristics  of  prose,  verse,  and  music  be  attributed 
to  regularity  of  time-lengths  between  accents? 


CHAPTER  XI 
ACCENT 

A  WORD  or  a  syllable  may  be  made  conspicuous  by  using 
it  in  one  or  more  of  several  different  ways.  It  may  be  given 
an  intensity  at  variance  with  the  other  words  by  which  it  is 
surrounded,  in  which  case  a  whisper  may  become  quite  as 
effective  as  a  very  loud  tone.  It  may  attract  attention  to 
itself  by  virtue  of  its  being  noticeably  prolonged  or  shortened, 
by  its  being  pronounced  upon  a  higher  or  lower  pitch  than  the 
common  level,  by  its  having  some  tone-color  peculiar  to 
itself,  or  by  the  occurrence  of  a  protracted  pause  either  before 
or  after  it.  Usually  three  or  four  of  these  ways  are  com- 
bined in  one  and  the  same  word  or  syllable  when  it  is  found 
necessary  to  give  to  the  word  or  syllable  an  unusual  degree 
of  prominence.  Broadly  speaking,  any  method  of  making 
a  word  or  a  syllable  more  conspicuous  than  the  other  words 
or  syllables  by  which  it  is  surrounded  accents  it,  —  that  is, 
causes  it  to  stand  out  to  a  marked  degree. 

Taken  in  its  simplest  terms,  however,  accent  is  usually 
thought  of  as  meaning  a  sufficient  increase  or  decrease  of 
intensity  to  make  a  sound  more  noticeable  than  the  other 
sounds  with  which  it  is  associated.  Normally  it  is  increase 
rather  than  decrease  of  intensity.  If  of  two  clicks  one  is 
just  audible  at  a  distance  of  eight  feet  and  the  other  at  the 
distance  of  sixteen  feet,  the  click  audible  at  the  distance 
of  sixteen  feet  is  for  our  purposes  twice  as  loud  as  the  one 
audible  at  the  shorter  distance.  These  two  sounds  represent 
phenomena  which,  when  properly  arranged,  may  establish 
a  rhythm.     Where  these  sounds  are  made  to  occur  periodi- 

122 


ACCENT  123 

cally,  or  at  such  intervals  as  are  accepted  by  the  ear  as 
periodic,  and  at  such  a  rate  as  permits  of  their  being  grouped 
by  the  perceiver,  unquestionably  rhythm  is  established. 
Even  in  such  a  rhythmic  pattern  as  that  furnished  by  an 
accented  beat  followed  by  an  unaccented  beat,  where  the 
time-intervals  between  all  the  beats  are  equal,  the  impression 
received  is  that  the  accented  beat  has  much  more  time- value 
than  the  unaccented.  Meumann  found  that  the  effect  of  the 
more  intense  sound  varied  with  its  position  in  the  group,  and 
that  the  interval  preceding  the  accented  beat  was  some- 
times overestimated,  sometimes  underestimated,  as,  too,  is 
the  interval  following  the  accented  beat.^  Macdougall  says 
that  only  the  interval  preceding  the  accented  beat  is  over- 
estimated and  that  the  interval  following  the  accented 
beat  is  underestimated. ^  For  my  purposes,  it  makes  no 
difference  which  is  right.  What  does  concern  me  is,  that 
the  presence  of  a  louder  sound  interferes  with  the  perception 
of  equality  among  the  time-intervals,  even  though  there  is 
present  in  the  intervals  no  thought  content  to  distract  the 
attention  from  the  making  of  accurate  judgments.  Shaw 
and  Wrinch '  affirm  that : 

"Intervals  which  are  bounded  by  a  fairly  loud,  sharp  sensation 
are  judged  to  be  shorter  than  intervals  bounded  by  a  weak  sensa- 
tion,* while  on  the  other  hand  they  are  judged  to  be  shorter  like- 
wise than  intervals  whose  end-signals  are  still  stronger.^  This 
difference  is  accounted  for  by  the  subjective  strain  of  attention 
or  expectation  in  the  weak  and  also  in  the  very  strong  sensations, 
which  tends  to  lengthen  the  intervals." 

1  Ernst  Meumann:   Phil.  Stud.,  II.,  264-306  (1894). 

2  Robt.  Macdougall:  "Harvard  Psy.  Stud."  I.,  Men.  Sup.  Psych. 
Rev.,  IV.,  (1903),  309-412. 

^  Shaw  and  Wrinch:  "A  Contribution  to  the  Psychology  of  Time," 
University  of  Toronto  Studies,  p.  19. 

*  Ibid.,  Tables  IV.,  V.,  VI. 

*  Wundt:  "Outlines  of  Psychology,"  p.  151. 


124     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

In  not  one  of  the  temporal  arts,  however,  is  it  ever  a 
question  of  judging  accent  and  accent  alone.  Accent  is 
always  found  in  combination  with  pitch,  tone-color,  and 
length;  and  not  infrequently  it  is  simply  impossible  to  tell 
to  the  presence  of  which  one  of  these  factors  the  greater 
intensity  of  a  sound  is  due.  For  the  moment  it  may  be  one 
or  another;  or  it  may  be  a  combination  of  all.  What  is 
called  by  prosodists  accent  is  in  reality  a  focal  point  of 
intensity.^  In  music  I  may  secure  such  an  effect  in  numerous 
ways:  (1)  I  can  make  one  sound  louder  than  the  others. 
(2)  I  can  introduce  a  deeper  sound  in  such  a  way  as  to  cause  it 
to  stand  out  from  a  series  of  lighter  sounds.  (3)  I  can  so 
repeat   a  particular  tone-color  as  to  make  it  prominent. 

(4)  I  can  repeat  a  sound  of  marked  length  so  frequently 
that  at  the  moment  of  its  beginning  it  is  felt  as  prominent. 

(5)  I  can  combine  all  these  into  one  sound,  as,  for  instance, 
would  be  the  case  if  I  introduced  into  an  orchestral  com- 
position in  six-eight  time  a  half-note  played  very  loudly  on 
a  heavy  brass  instrument  at  the  beginning  of  every  measure. 
Usually  the  marking  off  of  the  measures  is  by  mere  increase 
of  loudness;  but  this  means  of  accentuation  is  not  at  all 
obligatory.  Provided  a  feeling  of  a  fairly  definite  time-length 
has  once  been  established,  the  ear  will  seize  upon  any  phe- 
nomenon at  hand  that  will  assist  in  maintaining  the  perio- 
dicity of  occurrence.  Misled  by  half  truths,  some  prosodists 
have  claimed  that  increase  of  loudness  is  the  sole  means  of 
securing  this  marking;  others  have  said  that  the  recurrence 
of  a  sound  of  a  particular  length  is  the  thing;  still  others, 
that  a  change  of  pitch  is  the  controlling  factor.     Although 

1  E.  Landry:  "La  theorie  du  rhythme  et  le  rhythme  du  frangais 
declam^  "  (Paris,  1911).  Accent  is  made  to  depend  upon  energy,  and, 
especially,  upon  duration.  The  combined  effect  of  number,  duration, 
and  energy,  this  author  calls  weight. 

F.  Saran:   "Deutsche  Verslehre,"  (Munchen,  1907),  p.  21. 


ACCENT  125 

Scripture  ^  had  already  discovered  in  the  curves  which  he 
examined  the  presence  of  centroids  and  had  given  his  inter- 
pretation of  their  meaning,  still  it  is  greatly  to  the  credit  of 
that  most  excellent  prosodist,  T.  S.  Omond,  that  as  early  as 
1903^  he  had  seen  the  truth  of  the  matter,  and  that  by 
1907  he  could  express  it  thus  definitely  and  clearly: 

"I  submit  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  accent  with  us  does  not 
necessarily  imply  either  elevation  of  pitch,  or  increase  of  loudness, 
or  prolongation  of  time.  Normally  we  like  to  unite  all  three  on 
one  syllable,  and  this  is  probably  our  commonest  type  of  accent. 
But  it  is  possible  to  accent  a  syllable  by  lowering  the  voice  instead 
of  raising  it,  by  uttering  it  more  softly  instead  of  more  loudly,  by 
shortening  instead  of  prolonging  its  duration.  Any  device  which 
thus  distinguishes  a  syllable  from  its  fellows  makes  it  conspicuous, 
and  this  conspicuousness  is  what  we  really  mean  by  accent.  This 
rendering  conspicuous  of  some  syllables  more  than  others  is  highly 
characteristic  of  our  speech."  ^ 

Bolton  ^  found  that  his  subjects  mistook  a  strong  sound  to 
be  longer  than  a  weak  sound  of  the  same  duration  and  that 
a  long  sound  frequently  appeared  to  them  to  be  accented. 
Miner,  too,  although  investigating  with  lights,  found  that  an 
increase  in  duration  often  had  exactly  the  same  effect  upon 
the  subjects  as  if  it  had  actually  been  an  increase  in  intensity.^ 

1  E.  W.  Scripture:  "Researches  in  Experimental  Phonetics."  Studies 
from  the  Yale  Psychological  Laboratory,  Vol.  VIL,  1899,  pp.  100-101. 

2  T.  S.  Omond:  "A  Study  of  Metre,"  edition  of  1903,  pp.  20-30. 
(There  is  a  second  edition  brought  out  by  the  De  La  More  Press, 
London,  1907.) 

3  T.  S.  Omond:  "English  Metrists  (18th  and  19th  Centuries," 
pp.  3-5  (Oxford  University  Press,  London,  1907). 

■*  T.  L.  Bolton:  "Rhythm,"  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  1894, 
VI.,  pp.  145-238  and  310  and  488. 

'  J.  B.  Miner:  "Motor,  Visual  and  Applied  Rhythms,"  Psychological 
Review  publication,  Psychological  Monographs,  Vol.  V.,  No.  21  (Lan- 
caster, Pa.). 


126     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

1  am  convinced  that  the  possibiUty  such  as  Scripture's 
limited  investigations  suggested  may  be  regarded  as  a  thor- 
oughly established  fact  in  consequence  of  the  more  exhaustive 
experiments  of  Wallin.  The  latter  has  undoubtedly  come  to 
a  correct  understanding  of  the  case  in  thinking  of  accent  as 
produced  by  length,  pitch,  and  intensity,  singly  or  in  com- 
bination, when  centered  in  some  syllable  made  emphatic 
by  their  presence.  This  syllable  he  calls  a  centroid  syllable; 
and  he  defines  the  centroid  as  an  impression  which  arouses 
the  sense  of  hearing  to  a  certain  pitch  of  intensity  for  a  certain 
length  of  time.  ^  This  definition  is  equally  applicable  to 
prose,  verse,  and  music,  but  peculiarly  so  when  it  is  recog- 
nized that  the  psychological  differences  in  the  centroid  may 
be  accompanied  by  correlative  differences  of  tone-color, 
or  timbre,  of  voice.  Tone-color  "can  be  considered  as  a 
substitute  for  or  an  intensification  of  intensity  — •  whether 
because  of  strain  sensations  common  to  both,  or  because 
of  associations  which  reduced  to  their  ultimate  ground  are  of 
an  intensive  character."  ^  The  failure  of  Ettlinger  ^  and  of 
Woodrow  ■*  to  concur  in  this  is  due,  I  believe,  to  their  mis- 
understanding of  the  exact  nature  of  the  centroid.  "Al- 
though the  essence  of  the  centroid  is  always  a  threefold 
complexity,  any  one  of  the  elements  may  become  predominant, 
though  not  entirely  supreme."^  "The  elements  of  loudness 
ranks  highest  in  the  degree  of  intensity  attainable  through 
the  employment  of  any  one  element  as  a  substitutive  in- 
strumentality; duration  is  equal  to  about  one-half  the  effec- 
tiveness of  loudness,  while  pitch  independently  is  inferior  to 

^  Wallin:    "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  11. 

2  Squire:   American  Journal  of  Psychology,  XII.,  1901,  p.  558. 

^  Ettlinger :  Zeitschrift  fur  Psychologic  und  Physiologic  dcr  Sinnesor- 
gane,  XX.,  1900,  pp.  180-181. 

*  Woodrow:  "Role  of  Pitch  in  Rhythm,"  Psychological  Review, 
XVIII.,  No.  1,  Jan.,  1911,  pp.  61-62. 

5  Wallin:  Ibid.,  p.  20. 


ACCENT  1 27 

duration."^  In  a  later  article  ^  Wallin  takes  occasion  to 
emphasize  his  surprise  in  discovering  that  pitch  may  at  times 
play  the  dominant  role  in  the  speech  centroid.^  Mijake, 
too,  finds  a  relation  between  accent  and  pitch,  the  accented 
sound  having  generally  a  higher  pitch  than  the  unaccented.* 
This  rise  of  the  voice  Squire  attributes  to  the  desire  to  secure 
greater  ease  of  enunciation.*  In  Wallin's  records  it  is  very 
rare  that  any  one  element  became  even  approximately  in- 
dependent, thus  tending  to  heighten  the  effect,  in  harmony 
with  general  principles  of  contrast,  when  the  several  elements 
were  fitly  employed.^  Accordingly  he  was  able  to  classify 
centroids  as  loudness  centroids,  in  which  loudness  is  predomi- 
nant; loudness-pitch-duration  centroids,  in  which  loudness 
is  still  predominant;  loudness-pitch  centroids;  duration-loud- 
ness  centroids;  pitch-duration;  diiration-pitch;  etc.  Here 
both  the  principle  of  substitution  and  the  principle  of  synthe- 
sis must  be  invoked,  with  the  result  that  richness,  variety, 
and  all  the  pleasing  qualities  to  be  noticed  in  artistic  ren- 
derings of  prose,  verse,  and  music  are  secured.^  Since  in 
listening  to  a  composition  of  any  kind  the  ear  does  not 
analyze  the  various  intensities  which  it  hears,  but  accepts 
them  indiscriminately  as  accent,  it  is  exceedingly  inconven- 
ient, perhaps  impossible,  to  differentiate  them  in  scanning. 
Therefore,  I  believe  it  wiser  to  continue  to  use  one  symbol 

1  Ibid.,  pp.  18-19. 

2  "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and  Time,"  Psychological  Re- 
view, March,  1911,  XVIII.,  No.  2,  pp.  100-131,  and  May,  1911,  XVIII., 
No.  3,  pp.  202-222. 

3  WalUn:   "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and  Time,"  p.  209. 

*  Mijake:  "Researches  on  Rhythmic  Action,"  Studies  from  Yale 
Psychological  Laboratory,  1902,  pp.  1-48. 

*  Squire:  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  XII.,  1901,  p.  557. 

*  Wallin:   "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  pp.  18-19. 

^  Dr.  Herbert  Woodrow  does  not  agree  with  this.  I  shall  comment 
later  upon  his  point  of  view. 


128     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

for  all  these  different  shades  of  intensity,  provided,  of  course, 
exactly  what  factors  are  involved  be  kept  clearly  before  the 
mind. 

Great  difficulty  has  been  experienced  in  determining  at 
what  particular  point  in  a  sound  or  a  group  of  sounds  the 
moment  of  maximum  intensity  may  be  said  to  lie.  Scrip- 
ture found  the  centroids  in  the  following  lines  from  the 
record  of  the  reading  which  he  secured  to  be  located  as  repre- 
sented by  the  dot  below  the  printed  lines:  ^ 

19       34        23         24     17     77 
Who  killed    Cock     Rob  in? 

45  21       19       3       47  29 
I,  said  the  Sparrow, 

22    36  25     49  11     38  12  23     33     42 
With  my         bow         and         ar  row, 

33  12    33        21     22     5      21     16    95 
I  killed        Cock        Rob  in. 

"The  point  of  emphasis,"  he  remarks,  "may  lie  even  in 
some  weak  sound  or  in  some  mute  consonant  if  the  distri- 
bution of  the  neighboring  sounds  produces  an  effect  equivalent 
to  a  strong  sound  occurring  at  that  point.  Thus  the  point  of 
emphasis  in  the  third  line  lies  somewhere  in  the  group  mybow, 
probably  between  y  and  o."  ^  Briicke  gives  a  number  of 
rules  of  position  for  it  ;  ^  Meyer  regards  it  as  falling  at  a 

1  The  measurements  here  given  are  R.  H.  Stetson's  modifications  of 
the  original. 

2  E.  W.  Scripture:   "Researches  in  Experimental  Phonetics,"  p.  101. 

3  Briicke:  "Die  Physiologische  Grundlage  der  neuhochdeutschen. 
Verskunst,"  p.  24  (Wien,  1871). 


ACCENT  129 

particular  point;  ^  Miyake  ^  and  Brown  ^  found  it  marked 
by  a  tap  before  the  sound;  and  so  they  go  in  unanimity  of 
disagreement.  It  really  does  not  make  very  much  difference 
just  where  it  does  lie;^  but  it  is  quite  probable  that  each 
was  right  in  his  determination  of  the  point  of  emphasis  for 
the  particular  subjects  upon  whom  he  experimented.  The 
exact  position  of  the  centroid  is  worth  knowing  for  only  one 
reason,  and  that  is,  to  settle  the  question  as  to  whether  or  not 
there  is  equality  of  time-length  between  accents  in  either 
verse  or  in  music.  Unless  it  is,  possible  to  determine  with 
accuracy  the  points  of  maximum  intensity,  it  is  obviously 
impossible  to  obtain  accurate  measurements  of  the  time 
lengths  between  them.  Thus  far  absolute  accuracy  has  not 
been  achieved.  The  best  results  have  come  from  consider- 
ing the  moment  of  attack  for  the  emphatic  sounds  as  the 
point  from  which  to  measure.  In  music  this  point  normally 
would  be  the  beginning  of  the  measures;  in  verse  and  in 
prose  it  is  for  convenience  considered  as  beginning  the  em- 
phatic syllables.  What  really  counts  to  the  listener,  says  Dr. 
Woodrow,^  is  "neither  the  actual  interval  between  the 
sounds  nor  the  time  elapsing  from  the  beginning  of  one  sound 

1  Meyer:  "Beitrage  zur  deutschen  Metrik,"  Neuere  Sprachen,  1898, 
VI.,   122-123. 

"^  Miyake:  Studies  from  the  Yale  Psychological  Laboratory,  X.,  45, 
(1902). 

^  Brown:  "Time  in  English  Verse  Rhythm,"  p.  23,  Columbia  Con- 
tributions to  Philosophy  and  Psychology,  Vol.  XVII.,  No.  2  (Science 
Press,  New  York,  May,  1908). 

*  Hofbauer:  Archiv.  f.  d.  ges.  Physiol.  (Pfluger's),  1897,  Bd.  68, 
S.  553. 

A.  Cleghorn:   American  Journal  of  Psychology,  1898,  I. 

Robt.  Miiller:  Phil.  Stud.,  1901,  Bd.  17,  S.  1. 

E.  W.  Scripture:   "The  New  Psychology,"  p.  182,  (London,  1897). 

*  Herbert  Woodrow:    "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  50. 
Columbia  University   Contributions  to   Philosophy  and   Psychology, 
Vol.  XVIII.,  No.  1  (Science  Press,  New  York,  June,  1909). 


130    THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

to  the  beginning  of  the  next,  but  the  interval  between 
certain  points  of  greatest  subjective  stress,  the  subjective 
stress  being  due,  perhaps,  to  the  occurrence,  at  certain 
points,  of  greater  attention,  of  motor  performances,  or  to 
unknown  factors;  and  these  theoretically  possible  points 
of  greatest  subjective  stress  might  conceivably  occur  almost 
anywhere."  As  a  matter  of  fact,  they  do  not  occur  at  ran- 
dom, but  at  periods  of  a  fair  degree  of  regularity. 

An  examination  of  two  records  of  the  same  song  made  by 
Verrier  ^  show  the  first  four  measures  to  contain  the  following 
relative  time-lengths :  — 


I 

II 

III 

IV 

B  160 

116 

166 

178  (5) 

G  160 

116 

166 

133  (6) 

This  means,  of  course,  that  the  point  of  emphasis,  if  located 
at  the  beginning  of  each  measure,  can  not  be  regarded  as 
being  repeated  at  regular  time-intervals.  The  attempt  to 
play  in  time  to  a  metronome  will  convince  almost  any  one 
that  it  is  only  with  the  greatest  difficulty  that  the  accents 
in  music  can  be  got  to  fall  invariably  with  the  ticks.  Absolute 
regularity  is  not  only  impossible  but  disagreeable.  No 
person  who  plays  with  a  regularity  of  accent  approaching 
that  of  the  unvarying  tick  of  the  metronome  is  thought  of 
other  than  as  a  mechanical  performer;  and  every  one  recog- 
nizes that  mechanical  music,  whether  produced  by  hand  or 
by  pianola,  is  something  to  be  shunned. 

I  will  give  next  four  sets  of  measurements  made  by  Wallin, 
—  the  first,  of  a  piece  of  ordinary  prose;  the  second,  of 
oratorical  prose;  the  third  and  the  fourth,  of  four  lines  of 
verse.  The  specimen  of  verse  is  selected  because  of  its 
unusual  regularity.     For  the  first  two  the  unit  of  measure- 

1  "Essai  sur  les  principes  de  la  mdtrique  anglaise,"  torn  3,  p.  138. 


ACCENT  131 

ment  is  one-forty-eighth  of  a  second;    for  the  others,  one- 
fortieth.     The  dots  represent  the  centroids. 

(a)  (b)  (c) 

.     12      .     18    .         62  .     20     .  20  . 

I.    "The  class  of  ninety-nine  —  did  not  hold  a  very  high 

(d) 
29      .    34  .      70      .        38         .    20    .   27 

reputation  —  as  scholars,  —  either  for  study   or  for 
80 
morals.  — 

(e)  (f) 

.37  .21  .     21.  17.17.      26 

And  it  was  notorious  that  they  paid  no  attention  to  the 

.      21    . 
Sunday  services,"  — 
(p.  52.) 

(a)  (b)        (c)         (d)       (e) 

.       17     .  11  .        13  .      13  .  20  .        23       .      22 
II.    "Almighty  God,    unto   whom  all   hearts   are   open, — 

(f)       (g)       (h) 
.       32.     25        .  34  .     28      .  11  .     16  .     34 

all  desires  —  known,  —  and    from  whom  no  —  secrets 

are  hid." 
(p.  53.) 

(A,  read  as  prose.)  (a) 

(k)  (b)  (c)  (d) 

.    18    .       23  .     9  .    15  .    23      .   16  .  15 

III.    "Oh  yet  we  trust  —  that  somehow  good  will  be  the  final 


132     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

(e)        (f)  (g) 

17    .  49  .         23     .      24        .       21      .      53 

goal  of  ill,  —  to   pangs   of  nature,  —  sins   of  will,  — 

(h) 
.19  .25  .       21      . 

defects  of  doubt,  —  and  taints  of  blood."     (p.  59.) 

(B,  read  as  'poetry. ) 
.     20      .  28      .     9  .        ?    . 

IV.   ''Oh  yet  we  trust  —  that  somehow  —  good  — 

23     .    19  .      18.     21  .40 
Will  be  the  final  goal  of  ill,  — 

23     .       27       .      24     .      45 
To  pangs  of  nature,  —  sins  of  will,  — 

23    .         46  .         22      . 

Defects  of  doubt,  —  and  taints  of  blood."  —  (p.  59.) 

In  the  first  specimen  it  is  noteworthy  that,  if  those  periods 
in  which  pauses  occur  be  excluded,  and  if  (a)  and  (b)  be 
counted  as  one  length  and  (e)  and  (f)  as  one  length,  the  dif- 
ference between  the  shortest  time-intervals  between  cen- 
troids  (c)  and  the  longest  time-interval  between  centroids 
(d)  is  eighteen  units,  or  about  a  third  of  a  second.  Observe, 
too,  that,  when  the  time-intervals  containing  pauses  are 
divided  in  half,  the  time-length  of  each  half  is  very  nearly 
equal  to  the  time-length  of  ahnost  any  interval  near  it. 

In  the  second  specimen,  after  grouping  (a)  and  (b),  and 
(c)  and  (d),  and  (f)  and  (g)  together  as  single  nnits,  the 
difference  between  the  shortest  time-interval  (e)  and  the 
longest  time-interval  (h)  is  fourteen  units,  or  about  one- 
fourth  of  a  second. 

In  the  third  specimen,  after  combining  (a)  and  (b),  (c)  and 
(d),  (e)  and  (f),  and  (g)  and  (h),  the  difference  between  the 


ACCENT 


133 


shortest  time-interval  (k)  and  the  longest  time-interval  (one- 
half  of  g  plus  k)  is  eighteen  units,  or  almost  half  a  second. 

Treating  the  fourth  specimen  in  like  manner,  the  differ- 
ence is  ten  units,  or  one-fourth  of  a  second. 

In  all  cases  the  greatest  difference  is  found  to  occur  in 
those  time  periods  in  which  there  are  pauses.  The  greatest 
changes  in  the  time-lengths  between  centroids  are  observable 
after  the  pauses,  that  is,  before  the  time-sense,  or  muscular 
period  of  contraction,  or  whatever  one  chooses  to  consider 
it,  has  had  an  opportunity  to  reestablish  itself. 

Verrier's  prose  specimens  are  entirely  too  fragmentary 
to  deduce  anything  from;  and  even  his  specimens  of  verse 
are  hardly  more  than  phrases.     Here  is  an  example: 


Show  me 
39 


the  fair 
54 


would  scorn 
59 


to  spy  ^ 
63 


Neither  he  nor  Brown  was  measuring  the  distances  between 
centroids,  or  intensities;  but,  by  taking  Brown's  measure- 
ments of  syllable  lengths  and  using  the  accents  as  he  gives 
them,  I  can  arrive  at  a  rough  estimate  of  the  distance  between 
accents.  Even  rough  estimates,  however,  are  better  than 
none  at  all. 


''Break 
82 


break 
75 


break 
85 


On  thy  cold 
119 


gray  stones 
125 


oh  sea 
83 


But  the  ten 
62 


der  grace 
73 


of  a  day 
68 


that  is  dead 
120 


will  ne 
45 


ver  come  back 
86 

1  Paul  Verrier:  "Essai  sur  les  principes,"  etc.,  torn  3,  p.  233. 


to  me."  —  (p.  48.) 
60 


134     THE  FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 


The  following  lines  were  both  read  and  sung.  The  length 
of  the  periods  between  accents  is  given  in  ordinary  numerals 
for  the  readings,  in  italics  for  the  singing. 


"Blow 

blow 

breathe 

113 

116 

95 

173 

188 

173 

western 
70 

158 


and  blow 
92 

164 


sea.    — 

199 

176  +  112 


Wind  of  the 

89 
170 


(p.  50.) 


The  reading  required  774  units,  the  singing  1314. 


I  believe  I  have  showed  that  for  prose  nor  verse  nor  music 
is  there  any  accuracy  of  time-lengths  between  the  accents, 
though  there  is  a  greater  approximation  to  unity  for  verse 
than  for  prose  and  for  music  than  for  verse.  Further,  there 
is  a  tendency  to  prolong  the  time-intervals  between  accents 
as  ordinary  prose  moves  toward  oratory,  oratory  toward 
verse,  and  verse  toward  music. 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  Guest  and  others  have  said  that 
no  two  accented  syllables  can  appear  in  succession  without 
a  pause  intervening,  I  wish  to  exhibit  for  inspection  several 
instances  from  the  records  of  Wallin.  Of  course,  it  must  be 
remembered  that  accent  is  here  being  considered  as  a  com- 
bination of  loudness,  length,  and  pitch,  in  which  all  are  felt 
as  giving  the  syllable  greater  intensity  than  that  of  any  one 
of  the  syllables  adjacent. 

.21  .  14    .        17  . 

"Whose  fortunes  run  back  and  whose  spirits  mutiny. — 

(p.  62.     Prose  by  Francis  Bacon.) 


ACCENT 


135 


.20.  28.  30  .    14.     24    . 

"As  is  the  light  of  a  dark  eye  in  woman."  —  p.  48.    Byron. 

.   12     .  11    .  11.        22     . 
"Thou  wert  not  sent  for  slumber."  —  p.  48.     Byron. 

.9      .   13  .    50     .   13.      19     .       48    .    12  .  17. 
"Shut  those  eyes,  —  next  life  will  open,  —  stop  those  ears." 
—  p.  56.     Browning. 

Of  course,  in  the  final  analysis,  there  is  a  break  between 
each  syllable  and  the  following;   but  in  ordinary  speech  the 

(A)  (B) 


^^^^^^ 


ee^* 


-fi^- 


'S»-b« 


#-•- 


-^•H  etc. 


(C) 


!e^ 


etc. 


break  is  entirely  too  short  to  be  detected.  Only  when  breath 
is  taken  does  it  become  apparent. 

A  succession  of  accented  syllables  is  in  music  of  too  com- 
mon occurrence  to  need  more  than  a  very  few  illustrations. 
A  and  B  are  from  the  "Impromptu"  by  F.  Chopin  (Op.  29); 
C  is  from  "Good-bye  Sweet  Day,"  a  song  by  Kate  Vannah. 
It  is  understood,  of  course,  that  the  first  beat  of  each  measure 
is  always  played  with  an  accent  whether  the  accent  be 
written  or  not. 

As  to  the  real  nature  of  the  spondee,  Wallin^  has  this 
to  say: 

"In  the  1-syllabIe  interval,  the  centroid   extends  throughout 
its  entire  length.     This  interval  is  customarily  called   a  spondee.. 
The  definition  of  this  as  a  'foot  consisting  of  two  equally  accented 
^  "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech,"  p.  112. 


136     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

syllables,'  is  based  upon  the  misconception  that  a  centroid  interval 
consists  of  more  than  one  centroid.  When  the  components  of  a 
series  are  equally  strong  (are  real  centroids  as  the  theory  supposes) 
each  centroid  constitutes  a  so-called  foot:  there  is  no  reason  for 
including  two  centroids  in  the  interval,  rather  than  three  or  four, 
or  all  in  a  spondaic  verse.  The  spondee  of  prosody  is  thus  based 
upon  a  misconception  and  a  certain  arbitrariness.  The  spondee,  to 
mean  anytliing,  should  signify  a  1-syllable  centroid  interval;  and 
as  signifying  this,  it  may  be  a  convenient  term.  It  is  arbitrary 
and  unwarranted  to  include  two  centroid  intervals  in  one  interval. 
"The  1-syllable  interval  is  hmited  to  short  sequences.  In  long 
ones  the  tendency  is  to  so  emphasize  certain  of  the  centroids  as 
to  make  the  others  subordinate." 

Closely  allied  to  this  question  of  two  accented  syllables 
in  a  foot,  bar,  or  measure,  or  whatever  one  chooses  to  call  it, 
is  that  of  two  unaccented  syllables  as  filling  the  bar,  foot,  or 
measure,  as  in  the  so-called  pyrrhic  foot.  Again  I  can 
reply  by  offering  illustrations  from  Wallin. 

.  14  .    14 .     13.       25  .?     10     . 
I.    "The  big  rain  comes  dancing  to  the  earth."  —  (Byron) 
(p.  49) 


The  next  three  are  readings  of  the  same  passage  by  different 
persons. 

.   22     .     19     .  11       . 
II.    "Or  cast  as  rubbish  to  the  void."  —  (Tennyson)     (p.  60) 

.      25    .     29    . 
III.    "Or  cast  as  rubbish  —  to  the  void."  —  (p.  60.) 

12 

.     23     .  43  .?  17    . 

IV.  "Or  cast  as  rubbish  —  to  the  void."  —  (p.  61.) 

23 


ACCENT  137 

Here  in  II.  the  reader  unquestionably  accented  the  to  just 
as  if  it  had  been  an  important  syllable.  In  I.  and  in  IV. 
Wallin  is  unable  to  determine  just  what  took  place,  though 
he  writes  down  a  centroid.  It  is  more  than  probable  that 
following  the  tendency  that  had  been  set  up  to  accent  every 
other  syllable,  the  readers  here  continued  to  feel  the  accent, 
even  though  they  did  not  in  speech  give  the  accent  its  full 
force.  This  seems  to  me  to  be  undoubtedly  the  case  in  I. 
In  IV.,  however,  I  am  inclined  to  think,  that,  pausing  after 
hish,  the  reader  felt  the  accent  to  come  during  the  pause,  as 
in  III.  The  explosive  t,  following  immediately  after  the 
pause,  probably  received  a  little  more  prominence  than  usual, 
yet  without  causing  the  syllable  to  be  felt  as  a  centroid. 
In  III.  the  subjective  accent  falls  during  the  pause,  so  that 
to  and  the  may  be  considered  either  as  unaccented  syllables 
in  the  foot  of  which  the  subjective  accent  is  the  first  beat, 
or  as  the  first  syllable  of  the  foot  in  which  void  receives  the 
accent.  I  have  never  been  able  to  find  in  English  verse 
of  this  nature  a  single  case  in  which  one  of  three  things 
does  not  take  place.  In  the  first,  one  of  the  unaccented 
syllables  is  given  a  subjective  accent  to  make  it  conform 
to  the  general  scheme  of  periodicity  of  accent.  In  the  sec- 
ond, a  pause  is  introduced  in  order  that  the  subjective 
accent  may  be  felt  during  the  pause.  In  the  third,  the 
unaccented  syllables  belong  with  either  the  preceding  or 
the  succeeding  accented  syllable.  Exactly  the  same  con- 
dition holds  where  three  or  four  syllables  are  concerned 
instead  of  only  two. 

In  music  unquestionably  there  is  no  such  thing  as  having 
two,  or  any  other  number  of  unaccented  beats  fill  the  entire 
measure.  The  accent  must  come,  even  if  it  has  to  be  felt  as 
occurring  during  a  period  of  silence. 

Another  figment  of  the  prosodic  imagination  is  the  so- 
called  compensating  foot  such  as  occurs  in 


138     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

"  She  I  that  hath  that  I  is  clad  |  in    com  |  plete    steel."  ^ 

In  com  \  plete  steel  is  described  as  "a  pyrrhic  foot  compen- 
sated for  by  a  succeeding  spondee,"  which  "may  be  read  with 

a  suspended  or  deferred  stress  over  in  com.  Both  syllables 
of  the  succeeding  foot  are  heavily  accented."  The  fault  here 
is  with  the  grouping,  not  with  the  statement  that  two  unac- 
cented syllables  are  followed  by  two  accented.  The  theory  of 
substituting  one  foot  for  another,  in  which  Saintsbury  takes 
such  great  delight,  is  perfectly  meaningless,  because  there  is 
behind  it  no  unifying  principle.  Is  verse  a  sort  of  mosaic  or 
picture  puzzle  into  which  the  various  blocks  can  be  fitted? 
I  think  not.  The  way  has  not  yet  been  prepared  for  a  full 
explanation  of  what  constitutes  verse;  yet,  for  the  once,  adopt- 
ing the  method  of  scansion  used  above  and  considering  the  ac- 
cented syllable  to  have  twice  the  time  value  of  the  unaccented, 
something  akin  to  order  can  be  brought  out  of  disorder. 

"She  that  hath  |  that  is  |  clad  in  com  |  plete  |  steel." 

If  the  pause  after  that  be  considered  as  occupying  the  time  of 
an  unaccented  syllable,  at  once  each  measure  is  seen  to  con- 
tain the  same  number  of  beats.  What  is  there  to  be  com- 
pensated for? 

"I  suppose,"  Professor  Gayley  had  already  remarked  on 
the  preceding  page,  "that  sometimes,  however,  it  is  more 
reasonable  that  a  pyrrhic  (w>^)  should  receive  half  a  stress 
on  each  of  its  syllables  or  a  full  stress  on  the  second  than  that 
the  line  should  be  read  with  a  rhetorical  pause.  Such  may 
be  the  case  in 

'The  best  |  (and  of  |  the  prin  |  ces  some  |  were  such)'.  | 

*  Gayley  and  Young:  " English  Poetry :  Its  Principles  and  Progress," 
Ixvi  (Macmillan,  1908). 


ACCENT  139 

This  is  especially  true  when  the  syllable  to  be  stressed  has  a 

secondary  accent  of  its  own,  as  in 

/  /  /WW/ 

'To fur  I  ther  this  |  Achit  |  ophel  |  unites. 


>  If 


To  my  mind  it  is  far  more  reasonable  to  believe  that  the 
poet  introduced  the  parentheses  for  the  particular  reason  that 
he  wished  the  line  to  be  read  with  the  rhetorical  pause,  and 
that  this  pause  has  its  particular  value  in  the  rhythmical 
pattern  of  the  poem.  He  wrote  the  line  to  be  read,  not  to  be 
scanned;  and  he  could  not  have  wished  a  single  word  in  it 
to  be  accented  in  any  way  which  could  interfere  with  its 
meaning.  I  read  with  a  decided  pause  after  best.  And  of 
the  I  pronounce  so  rapidly  that  the  three  words  have  about 
the  same  time  value  as  any  one  of  the  other  syllables  marked 
as  short.  In  the  next  line  quoted,  this  does  not  modify 
Achitophel;  and  it  is  absolutely  essential  that  the  two  words 
be  separated  by  a  pause  if  either  the  sense  or  the  rhythm  is 
to  be  maintained.     So  I  read: 

"  To  further  |  this        A  |  chitophel  u  |  nites."  1 

The  centroids,  or  accents,  on  this,  chit,  and  nites  are  much 
heavier  than  those  on  fur  and  phel,  just  as  in  4/4  time  in 
music  the  accent  on  the  first  beat  is  much  heavier  than  that 
on  the  third.  I  believe  that  I  have  read  the  line  properly; 
and  I  also  believe  that  I  have  come  as  near  to  showing  its 
rhythmic  pattern  as  it  is  possible  to  come  with  the  symbols 
I  am  using. 

Both  hovering  accent  and  deferred  accent  must  be  con- 
sidered in  this  connection. 

Says  the  same  author : 

"In  the  first  line  of  'Lycidas, ' 

/  \       \  /     "^       ^        \         \ 

'  Yet  once  |  more,  O  |  ye  Lau  |  rels,  and  |  once  more, ' 


140     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

a  heavy  stress  hovers  over  both  syllables  of  the  second  foot,  and 
of  the  fifth;  the  unaccented  syllables  of  the  fourth  are  pronounced 
slowly,  as  if  they  divided  with  difficulty  the  httle  stress  that  they 
can  win  from  the  and.  This  is  hovering  accent.  When  it  stresses 
ahke  two  heavy  syllables,  fike  'more  0,'  it  may  be  called  spondaic, ^ 
like  'rels  and,'  it  may  be  called  deferred.  And  the  reader  will  find 
that  the  foot  with  the  deferred  stress  is  usually  followed  by  a  foot 
of  heavy  syllables,  spondaic,  Uke  the  final  'once  more,'  upon  which 
the  fighter  stress  seems  to  fall,  as  if  atoning  for  its  reluctance." 

I,  too,  read  every  word  in  this  passage  with  all  the  gravity 
and  all  the  deliberateness  I  can  put  into  it.  Read  thus  the 
syllables  are  of  about  equal  duration;  but  six  of  them  are 
centroid  syllables  in  which  it  is  difficult  to  distinguish  whether 
duration  or  loudness  is  the  more  responsible  for  the  intensity 
they  are  felt  to  possess.  In  considering  the  structure  of 
this  line  great  importance  must  be  attributed  to  the  pauses. 
The  scansion  given  above  neglects  them  entirely.  As  I 
read  the  line,  they  fall  as  follows : 

"  Yet  I  once  more,  |       O  ye  |  Laurels,     and  |  once  more." 

(a)  (b) 

Here  again  occurs  the  succession  I  have  already  explained. 
The  feet  contain  two  accents,  the  first  slightly  stronger 
than  the  second.  At  (a)  the  stronger  accent  comes  during  a 
pause;  at  (b),  the  weaker  accent.  Once  and  more  are  so 
greatly  protracted  that  they  are  of  about  the  same  duration 
as  an  accented  plus  an  unaccented  syllable.  The  so-called 
hovering  accent  is  nothing  more  than  a  centroid  in  which 
duration  is  more  prominent  than  loudness.  The  so-called 
deferred  accent  in  the  pyrrhic  is  here  easily  explained  as  two 
unaccented  syllables  separated  by  a  pause  during  which  a 
subjective  accent  is  felt  to  occur. 

Quite  a  number  of  prosodists  are  very  particular  to  explain 
the  differences  between  word  accent  and  logical  accent  and 


ACCENT  141 

metrical  accent.  Word  accent  is  the  greater  amount  of  empha- 
sis placed  upon  one  or  more  syllables  of  a  polysyllabic  word. 
Logical  accent  is  the  greater  amount  of  emphasis  placed  upon 
the  important  word  or  words  in  a  group  of  words.  Metrical 
accent  is  the  accent  given  a  syllable  in  verse  in  order  to  mark 
the  rhythm.  As  far  as  the  ear  is  concerned,  and  as  far  as 
any  method  of  recording  sound  waves  can  show,  there  is  no 
difference  between  them.  Emphasis  is  emphasis,  no  matter 
for  what  purpose  it  is  introduced;  and  neither  the  ear,  nor 
the  voice,  nor  records  of  the  voice,  show  any  distinction  as  to 
this  purpose.  So-called  metrical  accent  is  nothing  more  than 
the  result  of  arranging  syllables  in  such  a  way  that  both  the 
word  accent  and  the  logical  accent,  singly  or  in  combination, 
occur  with  sufficient  regularity  to  establish  a  feeling  of 
periodicity.  This  having  taken  place,  the  ear  occasionally 
demands  the  supplying  of  an  accent  at  some  point  where 
neither  the  word  accent  nor  the  logical  accent  would  natu- 
rally fall.  The  free  use  of  accents  in  prose  is  brought  under 
greater  restriction  in  verse.  In  music,  though  the  word  and 
the  logical  accents  frequently  fall  with  the  accent  at  the 
beginning  of  each  bar,  it  is  not  essential  that  they  should. 
Both  the  duration  and  the  accent  which  the  syllable  would 
normally  receive  give  place  to  such  prolongation  and  such 
accentuation  as  is  demanded  bj^  the  melody  and  by  the  neces- 
sity for  marking  off  the  time-intervals.  In  verse  written 
to  be  set  to  music  the  natural  accents  are  frequently  ne- 
glected; and  even  elsewhere,  if  the  feeling  of  periodicity  is 
sufficiently  strong  to  warrant  such  a  procedure,  especially 
if  this  feeling  would  be  destroyed  by  following  usual  habits 
of  speech,  the  accent  is  transferred  from  one  syllable  to  some 
other  upon  which  it  would  not  normally  fall.  An  accent 
thus  transferred  is  called  a  wrenched  accent.  Except  in  the 
ease  of  rhyming  syllables,  I  find  the  occasions  for  wrenching 
accents  very  few  indeed.     Usually  a  slight  pause  is  all  that  is 


142     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

necessary  to  adjust  the  equilibrium  and  to  bring  the  periodic 
accent  and  the  word  accent  together  at  the  right  moment. 

Even  after  accents  have  been  wrenched  and  everything 
else  possible  done  to  make  them  fall  at  exact  intervals  of 
time,  in  prose  nor  verse  nor  music  is  there  anything  approach- 
ing mathematical  precision  in  the  duration  of  the  time-lengths 
between  them.  Can  it  be,  then,  that  Samuel  Taylor  Cole- 
ridge^ was  right  in  saying  that  it  is  not  the  time-interval 
between  accents,  but  the  number  of  accents  in  the  line,  which 
characterizes  verse?     Let  us  see. 

It  is  quite  true  that  numberless  stanzas  are  to  be  found 
in  which  each  line  does  contain  the  same  number  of  accents 
or  in  which  alternate  lines  contain  the  same  number.  The 
"Cock  Robin"  stanza  as  recorded  by  Scripture,  "Break, 
break,  break"  as  measured  by  Brown,  and  "Oh  yet  we 
trust"  when  read  as  poetry  by  the  subject  upon  whom  Wallin 
experimented,  would  assuredly  be  reckoned  as  among  these. 
Two  other  subjects  read  this  same  passage  for  Wallin.  For 
the  first  record  by  each  it  was  written  as  prose  and  read  as 
prose.  Both  the  prose  and  the  verse  records  show  practically 
the  same  accentuation.  Two  subjects  regarded  the  following 
prose  passage  from  Bacon's  "Essay  on  Death"  as  poetry, 
and  gave  to  the  lines  the  number  of  accents  I  here  record; 

To  the  poor  Christian  that  sits  bound  in  the  galley;  5  6 

To  despairful  widows,  pensive  prisoners,  and  deposed  kings;  6  6 
To  them  whose  fortune  runs  back  and  whose  spirits  mutiny,  —  5  7 
Unto  such  death  is  a  redeemer,  and  the  grave  a  place  for  rest.   6  6 

Wallin's  record  of  his  own  reading  of  those  eighteen 
magnificent  lines  from  "Childe  Harold"  beginning 

"The  sky  is  changed!     and  such  a  change!     Oh  night," 
show  the  following  number  of  accents  to  the  line :  — 
7,  5,  6,  5,  5,  7,  5,  5,  6,  5,  7,  5,  4,  7,  7,  5,  5,  7. 
1  Preface  to  "Christabel,"  1816, 


ACCENT  143 

Surely  Coleridge  could  never  for  a  moment  have  doubted 
that  these  lines  are  poetry!  I  rather  wonder  what  he 
would  have  said  of  the  two  records  Wallin  made  of  the 
passage  I  here  quote  from  Browning.  The  first  line  has 
eight  centroids,  the  second  eight,  the  third  ten,  the  fourth 
twelve,  and  the  fifth  ten.  — 

^'Notliing!  Henceforth  Man's  existence  bows  to  the  monition  — 
wait!  — 

Take  the  joys  and  bear  the  sorrows,  neither  with  extreme  con- 
cern! — 

Living  here  means  nescience  simply:  —  'tis  next  life  that  helps  to 
learn. 

Shut  those  eyes,  next  life  will  open,  stop  those  ears,  next  life  will 
teach 

Hearing's  office,  close  those  lips,  next  life  will  give  the  power  of 
speech." 

No  one  is  more  willing  than  I  am  to  admit  that  some  prose 
is  so  closely  akin  to  verse  and  some  verse  so  closely  akin  to 
prose  that  it  is  very  difficult  to  classify  it  properly;  yet 
I  can  not  believe  for  a  moment  that  the  number  of  accents 
in  the  line  will  aid  in  the  determination,  nor  yet  that  redu- 
cing the  number  of  accents  in  the  lines  until  there  is  uni- 
formity could  possibly  make  the  lines  any  more  poetic  than 
they  are  already.  So  Coleridge,  too,  was  misled  by  a  half- 
truth,  though  I  hope  to  show  later  that  there  is  quite  an 
amount  of  pith  in  his  argument. 

When  regarded  as  the  sole  determining  factor,  not  one  of 
the  phenomena  thus  far  considered  can  be  said  to  differ- 
entiate prose  from  verse  or  verse  from  music.  Pause  and 
rhyme  remain  as  the  only  possible  hope  of  solution,  —  that 
is,  if  the  solution  is  to  be  found  in  a  single  phenomenon.  I 
turn  first  to  the  investigation  of  the  pause. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE    PHRASE:    ITS    NATURE    AND    ITS    LENGTH 

Those  gaps  which  can  be  heard  between  the  individual 
sounds  when  the  revolving  disc  of  a  phonograph  is  suffi- 
ciently slowed  down  in  reproducing  a  speech  record  are  too 
small  to  be  distinguished  by  the  ear  except  when  some 
method  such  as  this  is  resorted  to.  Therefore,  they  can 
not  be  looked  upon  as  entering  into  the  rhythmic  scheme 
of  any  art  form,  and  can  be  neglected,  except  where  in  mass 
they  must  be  considered  as  forming  an  addition  to  the 
total  amount  of  time  occupied  by  a  number  of  syllables. 
The  pause  of  which  I  shall  speak  is  clearly  distinguishable 
at  all  times.  It  is  necessitated  by  the  impossibility  of 
pronouncing  more  than  a  limited  number  of  syllables  dur- 
ing one  breath.  At  the  moment  of  inspiration  no  sound 
can  be  produced.  Therefore,  in  order  that  breathing  may 
not  interfere  with  speech  or  speech  with  breathing,  we  are 
forced  to  arrange  our  words  in  such  a  way  that  the  moments 
of  inspiration  come  only  after  groups  of  related  words.  At 
the  same  time  natural  breathing  has  to  be  altered  very 
materially  in  order  to  avoid  breaking  the  thought  into 
unrelated  groups.  The  breath  may  be  exhaled  gradually 
during  the  pronunciation  of  the  words,  it  may  be  forcibly 
expelled  at  the  end  of  the  word  group,  or  it  may  be  held  at 
the  close  of  the  group,  in  such  a  way  as  to  give  the  effect 
of  a  pause;  but  inspiration  can  come  only  at  the  end  of 
the  phrase.  When  it  takes  place  elsewhere,  the  phrase  is 
broken.  If  an  unusually  long  pause  is  introduced  between 
two  beats,  there  is  always  a  feeling  of  suspense  or  tension. 

144 


THE   PHRASE:    ITS   NATURE   AND   ITS   LENGTH    145 

"As  long  as  tensions  are  maintained,  there  is  rhythmic 
continuity;  the  feeling  of  tension  is  the  strain  of  opposi- 
tion between  the  opposing  muscle  sets."  ^  Thus  certain 
habits  of  speech  have  been  formed,  giving  at  the  close  of 
each  breath  period  a  pause,  "which  is  demonstrably  not 
a  function  of  any  of  the  intervals  of  the  period,"  but  dur- 
ing which  the  sense  of  muscular  tension  dies  out,  in  this 
way  producing  a  feeling  of  finality.^  The  grouping  together, 
in  a  single  exhalation,  of  words  belonging  together  in  thought 
is  called  phrasing.  If  words  not  belonging  together  in 
thought  are  grouped  as  if  they  did  belong  together,  the 
phrasing  is  faulty.  In  the  sense  in  which  I  am  using  the 
word,  the  phrase  may  be  either  a  single  word  or  a  group  of 
words.  The  grammatical  divisions  of  sentence,  member, 
clause,  phrase,  and  word  have  no  unit  existence  for  the 
ear  except  in  so  far  as  they  can  be  made  to  stand  apart 
from  each  other  in  a  group.  One  of  the  most  readily  avail- 
able methods  of  grouping  words  is  by  pausing  after  each 
group,  —  that  is,  by  phrasing  the  words.  From  this  point 
of  view,  the  sentence  I  am  here  is  a  phrase;  and  the  com- 
plex sentence.  When  you  want  me,  I  am  here,  consists  of 
two  phrases,  or  two  breath  groups,  of  which  the  subordi- 
nate clause.  When  you  want  me,  is  one,  and  the  principal 
clause,  I  am  here,  is  the  other.  Of  course,  Mary,  when  you 
want  me,  I  am  here,  has  four  breath  groups,  or  phrases,  of 
which  the  prepositional  phrase  of  course  is  the  first;  the 
word  Mary,  the  second;  the  subordinate  clause  when  you 
want  me,  the  third;  and  the  principal  clause  /  am  here,  the 
fourth.  The  necessity  for  phrasing  is  in  music  as  great 
as  it  is  in  prose  and  verse,  although,  because  of  the  deeper 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  445,  II.  Harvard 
Psychological  Studies,  Vol.  I.,  Psychological  Review  Monograph  Sup- 
plements, Vol.  IV.,  (Whole  No.  17),  Jan.,  1903  (Lancaster,  Pa.). 

2  Ibid.,  p.  445,  IV. 


146     THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

breathing  required  for  singing,  the  phrases  of  music  can 
be  of  much  greater  length  than  those  of  either  prose  or 
verse.  The  points  of  inquiry  for  this  discussion  should 
be:  (1)  Are  the  phrases  in  prose,  in  verse,  or  in  music 
of  sufficient  equality  of  length  to  establish  anything  ap- 
proaching periodicity?  (2)  Would  a  periodicity  of  this 
type  be  sufficiently  marked  to  differentiate  prose  from 
verse  or  verse  from  music? 

I  do  not  know  of  any  measurements  that  have  been  made 
especially  to  test  the  length  of  phrases;  ^  but  of  measure- 
ments made  for  other  purposes  there  is  quite  a  sufficient 
number  that  can  be  of  use  here  to  justify  the  formulation 
of  several  very  definite  conclusions. 

The  selections  which  follow  are  taken  from  Wallin.  The 
first  two  are  prose.  The  third  is  verse  read  as  if  it  were 
prose.  The  unit  of  measurement  is  one-fortieth  of  a  second. 
The  centroids  are  indicated  by  dots;  the  pauses,  by  dashes. 
The  curved  lines  (- — •)  are  my  own  marking  of  the  phrases  as 
I  conceive  them  to  be.  It  is  not  always  possible  to  measure 
the  exact  length  of  the  phrases;  but  the  irregularity  is  so 
great  that  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  deal  in  small  numbers. 


.       18  .      16  .         27  .    14 

I.     "Washington  was  a  statesman  of  the  highest  order, 

18 


.  31 .   19  .  19      .     15      .     11  .        42  .16      . 

never  a  wily  scheming  pol    i    tician When  a  cabal 

32 

1  "An  Experimental  Study  of  Musical  Enjoyment,"  by  H.  P.  Weld 
{Amer.  Journ.  Psychol.,  1912,  XXIII.,  pp.  245-308),  is  interesting  in 
many  particulars;  but  unfortunately  his  subjects  were  listeners,  not 
producers.  From  them  no  constant  relation  between  respiration  and 
the  musical  phrasing  could  be  established. 


THE  PHRASE:    ITS  NATURE  AND  ITS   LENGTH    147 


20     .        20  .  10  .      25  .  16 .     16 

was  formed to  remove  him  from  the  command  and  elevate 

? 


47     .    15    .   14    .       16    .       20       .      25 

Gates, in  perfect  equipoise  of  mind  and  temper, he 

27  6 


.      23  .         59       .  25  .     16     .    52 

moved  not  a  finger. Neither  was  he  a  brilhant  orator." 

47 

-(p.  51.) 
Approximate  lengths  of  the  phrases :  — 

16,  57,  105,  40,  50,  32,  84,  45,  43. 


.17      .  11  .      13     .    13  .  20    .       23  .    22 
II.     "Almighty  God,  unto    whom    all   hearts  are  open, 

7 


.  32     .25  .  34    .      28      .    11    .  16.     34 

all  desires known, and  from    whom    no secrets 

9  15  8 


.     .44  .25  .17  .     13  .         31 

are  hid ;  Cleanse  the  thoughts  of  our  hearts by  the 

39  8 


.     20  .    33  .     20  .        35  .         18      . 

inspiration  of  thy  Holy    —  Spirit, that  we  may    per- 

27 


148  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 


26       .  36  .     15     .  32    .   14 

fectly  love  —  thee,  —    and  worthily  magnify  —  thy 
?  19  11 


.  16      .  45  .  34       . 

holy    Name; through  Christ  —  our  Lord."  —  (p.  53.) 

25  12 

Approximate  lengths  of  the  phrases:  — 

28,  84,  71,  99,  35,  30,  85,  59,  43,  40,  25,  18. 


.      21  .    15     .  14     .     21    .      25 

III.     "Nothing! Henceforth    man's    existence 

8  5 


28  .  7  .  26  .32       10       .    16  .   18 

bows  to    the  mo    nition wait ! Living  here  means 

8  23 


.  17       .    35  .  12      .   11    .      23      . 

nesience  simply : '  tis    next     life  that  helps  to 

25 


41      .     11    .    10  .      32        .  12.  20   .  41 

learn. Shut     those  eyes, next     hfe Will  open ". 

29  20  6  23 

-  (p.  56.) 

Approximate  length  of  the  phrases :  — 

13,  75,  32,  9,  82,  81,  71,  79,  33,  20,  24. 


THE  PHRASE:    ITS  NATURE  AND  ITS  LENGTH    149 

I  will  next  give  for  inspection  three  selections  of  poetry 
treated  in  the  same  manner  as  I  have  treated  the  prose. 


23        .        52   .     20      .       20     .    26 

IV.     "Nothing! Hence forth    man's    existence 

10  44 


35  .23  .17  .  .   24 

bows  to  the  monition Take   the  joys and  bear  the 

8  29 


.37  .    12      .  20         .25  .      40    .     18 

sorrows neither  with    extreme    concern Living 

28  34 


.     26     .     15     .     19       .43  .13 

here means    nescience  simply : 'tis     next  life 

?  30 


24       .    20        50  .     9     .      13    .     50     .  13    . 

that  helps    to  learn, Shut  those    eyes, next    life 

34 


19.   48 

will  open ".  —  (p.  56.) 

33 

Approximate  lengths  of  the  phrases :  — 

13,  28,  46,  50,  8,  27,  36,  12,  51,  30,  47,  27,  38,  38,  47. 


150    THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 


.    20       .  28    .     9    . 

V.     "0  yet  we  trust that  somehow good 

13  9  9 


23    .        19  .       18.     21   .    40 

Will  be  the    final    goal  of  ill, 

37 


.     23    .  27  .        24  .     45 

To  pangs  of  nature, sins  of  will, 

15  37 


.      23      .         46  .         22     .       61 

Defects    of  doubt, and  taints  of   blood; 

34  43 


.      18     .       23  .     20       .     48 

That  nothing  walks    with  aimless  feet; 

43 


.     10  .  13 .  27    .        19 .  36 

That  no    one    life shall  be  destroyed, 

11  33 


27.     22  .       14     .      48 

Or  cast  as    rubbish to  the    void, 

?  34 


THE  PHRASE:    ITS  NATURE  AND  ITS  LENGTH    151 


26         .         23        .  41      . 

When  God  hath  made    the   pile complete."  — 

16         (p.  59.) 

Approximate  lengths  of  the  phrases :  — 

?,  25, 25, 10, 63, 37, 29, 34, 34,  69, 35, 27, 39, 24,  ?,  80. 


21    .    44  .     23      26       .     43 

VI.  "The  sky  is  changed! and  such  a  change! 

34  35 


.   19. 

43 

Oh  night, 

19 

50  .  42      .17    .  31 

And  storm and  darkness, ye  are  wondrous 

21  11 


43 

strong, 

28 


.     18   .     32         .       43        .  20 .    28  .    30 

Yet  lovely  in  your  strength, as    is  the  light 

33 


.      14    .       24    .         45     .      20.     32 

Of  a  dark    eye  in    woman ! Far  along, 

35  13 


152     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 


23.  35   .  22.     25  .      36 

From  peak  to    peak, the    rattling  crags  among 

18  25 


.       27     .18      .     55  .  24     .     14.     36.      30 

Leaps  the  Hve  thunder! Not  from    one  lone  cloud, 

30  18 


.       16      .  25    .  18    .         21     .  43 

But  every    mountain    now  hath    found    a  tongue, 

23 


.      16    .  35     .  20         .       20  .         43 

And  Jura    answers, through    her  misty    shroud, 

14  32 


.28  .     21  .  41        .         19    .    33  . 

Back  to  the  joyous  Alps, who call to  her aloud!" 

22  ?  22 

-  (p.  47.) 

Approximate  lengths  of  the  phrases:  — 

34,  57,  35,  28,  40,  58,  65,  92,  21,  35,  38,  64,  60,  84,  43,  54, 
52,  50,  59,  72. 

In  the  following  extracts  taken  from  the  work  of  Dr. 
Warner  Brown,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  pauses 
at  the  end  of  the  line  are  calculated  as  part  of  the  time 
value  of  the  final  word  of  the  line.     This,  of  course,  makes 


THE  PHRASE:    ITS  NATURE  AND  ITS  LENGTH    153 

the  irregularity  of  phrase  length  apparently  greater  than 
it  really  is.  The  phrase  length  is  written  at  the  close  of 
each  phrase. 


VII.     "Double  (73),  double  (81),  toil  and  trouble  (198), 


Fire  burn  (124)  and  caldron  bubble  (281)."— (p.  51.) 


VIII.     "Each  purple  peak  (178),  each  flinty  spire  (177), 

Was  bathed  in  floods  (159)  of  living  fire  (223)." 

-(p.  51.) 


IX.         "Wha  will  be  a  traitor  knave?     (206) 


Wha  can  fill  a  coward's  grave?  (243) 

Wha  so  base  as  be  a  slave?  (212) 

Let  him  turn  and  flee."  (49)  —  (p.  62.) 


X.     "The  splendor  falls  (141)  on  castle  walls  (193) 


And  snowy  summits  (181)  old  in  story."  (251) 

-  (p.  62.) 


XI.     "I  stood  on  the  bridge  (123)  at  midnight  (118)' 
As  the  clocks  (68)  were  striking  the  hour  (217) 
And  the  moon  rose  o'er  the  city  (229) 


Behind  the  dark  church  tower"  (330)  —  (p.  62.) 


154     THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 


XII.    "Sunset  (94)  and  evening  star  (174) 
And  one  clear  call  (167)  for  me  (115) 


And  may  there  be  no  moaning  (170)  of  the  bar  (101) 
When  I  (56)  put  out  to  sea."     (247)  —  (p.  62.) 


XIII.     "The  day  is  done  (150)  and  the  darkness  (115) 

Falls  (from  the)  wings  (of  the)  night."  (178) 

-  (p.  62.) 


XIV.     "Know  ye  the  land  (118)  where  the  cypress  and 
myrtle  (214) 


Are  emblems  of  deeds   (143)    that  are  done  in 


their  clime?"  (317)  —  (p.  63.) 


XV.     "And  he  dances  (103),  and  he  yells  (141); 


Keeping  time  (123),  time  (79),  time  (110), 
In  a  sort  of  Runic  rhyme  (212), 


To  the  psean  of  the  bells  (195)  — 


Of  the  bells  (162) : 

Keeping  time  (111),  time  (78),  time  (109), 

In  a  sort  of  Runic  rhyme  (212), 


To  the  throbbing  of  the  bells  (242), 


THE  PHRASE:    ITS  NATURE  AND  ITS  LENGTH    155 


To  the  tolling  of  the  bells  (210), 
Of  the  bells  (114),  beUs  (79),  bells  (75),  bells  (113), 
Bells  (79),  bells  (74),  bells  (112)  — 
To  the  moaning   (78)   and  the  groaning  of  the 
bells."  (223)  —  (p.  68.) 

The  following  is  from  E.  W.  Scripture  with  the  measure- 
ments as  altered  by  R.  H.  Stetson  in  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme," 
page  463. 


XVI.     "  '  Who  killed  Cock  Robin? '  (194) 
'I,'  said  the  sparrow,  (164) 


'With  my  bow  and  arrow,  (291) 
I  killed  Cock  Robin.'"  (258) 

The  next  is  from  R.  H.  Stetson:  — 


XVII.     "I  saw  a  ship  a  sailing  (313), 
A  sailing  on  the  sea  (233), 
And  it  was  full  of  pretty  things  (244), 


For  baby  and  for  me."  (193) 

—  ("Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  463.) 

If  the  eighth  note  be  regarded  as  the  standard  of  meas- 
urement, the  Franz  Schubert  settings  of  "Hark,  Hark!  the 
Lark!"  and  of  "Who  is  Sylvia?"  show  the  following  phrase 
lengths:  — 


156     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 


XVIII.     "Hark,  hark!  the  lark  (6)  at  Heaven's  gate  sings, 

(6) 


And  Phoebus  'gins  to  rise,  (12) 

His  steeds  to  water  at  those  springs,  (12) 

On  chahc'd  flower's  that  lies,  (11) 

On  chalic'd  flow'rs  that  lies!"  (9) 


XIX.     "Who  is  Sylvia,  (12) 
What  is  she,  (12) 


That  all  our  swains  commend  her?  (16) 


Holy,  fair  (12),  and  wise  is  she;  (14) 
The  heav'ns  such  grace  did  lend  her  (16) 


That  adored  (12)  she  might  be,  (12) 
That  adored  she  might  be."  (28) 

Still  using  the  eighth  note  as  the  unit,  Bruno  Huhn's  in- 
terpretation of  "Invinctus"  proves  to  be  equally  regular  in 
its  phrasal  structure. 


"Out  of  the  night  that  covers  me,  (16) 
Black  as  the  pit  from  pole  to  pole,  (14) 
I  thank  whatever  gods  may  be  (16) 
For  my  unconquerable  soul."  (16) 


THE   PHRASE:    ITS   NATURE   AND   ITS  LENGTH    157 

The  first  three  phrases  of  the  Adagio  sostenuto  movement 
of  "Opus  27,  No.  2"  ("Moonlight  Sonata")  by  Beethoven, 
show  sixteen,  four,  and  sixteen  units  respectively.  The 
first  four  phrases  of  the  Allegretto  movement  give  ten,  four, 
four,  and  ten  respectively.  The  first  three  of  the  Presto 
agitato  are  fifteen  each. 

"Opus  32,  No.  1 "  ("Nocturne  in  B  Major")  by  F.  Chopin 
has  seventeen  units  in  its  first  phrase,  seven  in  its  second, 
eight  in  its  third,  and  fifteen  in  its  fourth. 

Examples  of  this  sort  might  be  produced  indefinitely; 
and  it  could  easily  be  shown  how  in  music  the  constant 
repetition  of  the  same  phrase-length  is  sometimes  felt  as 
the  controlling  time  interval  in  the  composition.  Although 
phrase-lengths  are  very  much  more  uniform  in  vocal  music 
than  in  instrumental,  because  of  the  limitations  set  in  the 
former  by  the  breath,  still  it  should  never  be  thought  for 
a  moment  that  they  are  given  anything  even  approaching 
the  regularity  assumed  for  them  by  the  notation.  The 
important  point  is  that  they  are  of  sufficient  regularity  to 
be  felt  as  uniform  and  to  be  regarded  as  temporal  units. 

It  must  always  be  borne  in  mind  that  we  have  no  accu- 
rate means  of  judging  temporal  equality.  Yet  time-rela- 
tions are  of  importance  in  verse,  and  the  phrases  of  the 
movement  cycle  have  certain  duration  relations  which  can 
be  varied  only  within  limits.^  "Any  unusual  irregular- 
ity, like  a  lag,  is  noted  because  of  the  sense  of  strain  and 
because  other  events  supervene  in  the  interval."  ^  Pauses 
are  essential  to  rhythm.  It  is  only  when  they  are  so  long 
that  the  feeling  of  continuity  is  interfered  with  that  they 
become  subversive  of  rhythm. 

^  J.   E.  Wallace  Wallin:    "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and 
Time,"  Psycho.  Rev.,  May,  1911,  Vol.  XVIII.,  pp.  211-212. 
R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  463. 
2R.  H.  Stetson:    Ibid.,  p.  461. 


158     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

From  the  measurements  I  have  presented,  it  would  ap- 
pear, then,  (1)  that  duration  of  phrase-length  is  quite  as 
variable  as  that  of  the  syllable  or  the  pause  or  as  the  time- 
length  between  accents;  (2)  that  the  tendency  is  from 
extreme  irregularity  of  time-length  for  the  phrases  of  ordi- 
nary prose  toward  greater  regularity  for  verse  and  still 
greater  regularity  for  certain  types  of  music;  and  (3)  that 
in  and  of  themselves  time-lengths  between  pauses  are  not 
of  sufficient  regularity  to  establish  a  feeling  of  periodicity 
or  to  differentiate  prose  from  verse  or  verse  from  music. 

Thomas  R.  Price  evidently  thought  otherwise,  when,  in 
speaking  of  the  phrase  as  a  stave,  he  wrote :  — 

"The  stave  is  a  group  of  feet,  from  one  to  four  in  number,  which 
can  be  pronounced  together,  without  pause  upon  one  breath,  and 
be  dominated  by  one  accent.  As  such  it  is  the  definite  unity  of 
English  verse-formation.  The  English  stave  can,  indeed,  if  we 
choose,  be  analyzed  into  its  separate  feet,  and  broken  into  trochees 
and  dactyls.  But  this  breaking  up  of  the  stave  into  separate 
feet  is  something  scholastic  and  artificial.  The  stave  in  its  na- 
ture is  indivisible,  living  and  moving  together,  the  unit  of  verse 
construction."  ^ 

That  the  domination  of  the  phrase  by  a  single,  principal 
accent  "about  which  a  number  of  subordinate  accents  are 
grouped  is  characteristic  not  only  of  poetry  but  of  the 
simplest  rhythms,"  both  Meumann  and  Stetson  ^  agree. 
"At  some  point  in  the  period  there  is  a  definite  climax,  a 
chief  accent.  This  is  strikingly  seen  in  nonsense  verse 
spoken  with  a  heavy  accent  within  the  verse.  The  accent 
does  not  stand  out  from  a  dead  level,  but  the  verse  cul- 
minates at  that  point."     Both  Scripture  and  WaUin  noted 

1  "The  Construction  and  Types  of  Shakespeare's  Verse  as  seen  in 
'Othello,'"  p.  14,  in  "Papers  of  the  New  York  Shakespeare  Society," 
1888  (Triibner  and  Co.,  London;   Brentano  and  Bro.,  New  York). 

2  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  456. 


THE   PHRASE:    ITS   NATURE   AND   ITS   LENGTH    159 

the  dominant  character  of  one  or  more  centroids  in  each 
breath  group.  From  this  opinion  I  do  not  wish  to  dissent; 
yet  I  can  not  think  with  Dr.  Price  that  the  stave  is  "the 
unit  of  verse  construction,"  although  we  are  in  entire  ac- 
cord as  to  its  indivisibihty  and  as  to  its  movement  as  a 
whole.  The  phrase  is  another  of  those  all-important  fac- 
tors in  the  building  up  of  verse;  still,  when  unattended  by 
other  equally  important  factors,  it  of  itself  is  insufficient 
to  characterize  verse. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

RHYME    AND    THE    LINE:     THEIR    RELATION    TO    THE 

PHRASE 

What  is  rhyme?  How  nearly  periodic  in  character  is 
it?  Can  it  be  regarded  as  differentiating  prose  from  verse 
or  verse  from  music? 

Rhyme  is  correspondence  of  tone-color  in  any  two  or 
more  sounds  when  sufficiently  close  to  each  other  for  the 
correspondence  to  be  immediately  perceived.  This  corre- 
spondence may  be  of  three  kinds.  The  first  type,  which  is 
constituted  by  the  correspondence  of  consonants  at  the 
beginning  of  syllables,  is  known  as  alliteration}  In  Old 
English,  words  beginning  with  vowels  were  regarded  as 
alliterative,  because  the  initial  vowel  was  invariably  pre- 
ceded by  rough  breathing  just  as  if  the  letter  had  been  writ- 
ten in  front  of  the  vowel.  The  second  type  of  rhyme,  called 
assonance,  consists  in  correspondence  of  tone-color  of  the 
accented  vowel  in  two  or  more  words  when  the  sounds 
preceding  and  following  the  accented  vowel  are  not  notice- 
ably alike.  It  is  common  in  Spanish  verse;  but  it  has 
never  found  favor  in  English,  though  several  poets  have 
attempted  to  use  it  as  a  substitute  for  the  particular  type 
of  rhj^me  which  has  been  most  popular  since  alliterative 
verse  lost  its  vogue.  This  third  type  of  rhyme  is  com- 
monly spoken  of  as  rhyme,  and  under  this  name  is  regarded 
as  distinguished  from  both  alliteration  and  assonance.     It 

1  Fred  Newton  Scott's  article  on  "Vowel  Alliteration  in  Modern 
Poetry  "  (Modern  Language  Notes,  Dec,  1915,  Vol.  XXX.,  pp.  233-237) 
is  interesting  in  more  than  one  particular. 

160 


RHYME  AND  THE  LINE  161 

is  in  this  accepted  meaning  of  the  word  that  I  shall  use  it 
hereafter.  Rhyme,  then,  is  correspondence  in  tone-color 
of  the  final  accented  vowel  and  of  all  the  following  sounds 
in  one  word  to  the  final  accented  vowel  and  all  the  fol- 
lowing sounds  in  one  or  more  other  words,  when  the  sound 
immediately  preceding  the  accented  vowel  is  not  the  same 
in  any  two  words.  Where  the  consonant  preceding  the 
accented  vowel  is  the  same,  the  rhyme  is  called  identical. 
Identical  rhyme  is  much  sought  after  in  French;  but  Eng- 
lish eschews  it,  although  admitting  as  a  makeshift  another 
form  of  rhyme  which  to  my  ear  is  even  more  objectionable 
than  this.  The  number  of  rhyming  words  in  English  are 
for  some  combinations  comparatively  few.  Therefore, 
words  that  in  print  look  as  if  they  ought  to  rhyme  are  some- 
times substituted  for  pure  rhymes.  These  rhymes  are 
called  eye  rhymes.  In  eye  rhyme  the  accented  vowel  in  the 
rhyming  words  is  not  of  exactly  the  same  tone-color,  —  as 
blood  and  good. 

Although  in  Anglo-Saxon  verse  alliteration  is  a  conspic- 
uous element  and  appears  with  a  regularity  which  shows 
it  to  have  been  governed  by  definite  rules,  its  presence  or 
its  absence  does  not  differentiate  Anglo-Saxon  verse  from 
Anglo-Saxon  prose;  neither  is  it  today  a  distinguishing 
element  in  either  our  verse  or  our  prose,  though  it  is  to  be 
found  in  both.  At  no  time  has  it  ever  occurred  with  suffi- 
cient regularity  to  estabHsh  a  feeling  of  periodicity,  though 
whenever  it  has  appeared  it  has  always  aided  toward  that 
end.  Coming  at  the  beginning  of  the  word,  it  helps  in 
making  the  accented  syllable  more  conspicuous;  and  that 
is  all  it  does  do,  if  the  pleasure  derived  from  the  ful- 
fillment of  the  Law  of  the  Return  be  for  the  moment  over 
looked. 

Rhyme  does  not  occur  in  prose  except  accidentally. 
Assonance    does;     yet,    having    no    definite    function    to 


162     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

perform,  its  presence  there  is  entirely  purposeless.  In  verse, 
as  has  been  noted  already,  assonance  is  sometimes  used 
as  a  substitute  for  rhyme.  It  can,  therefore,  be  considered 
along  with  rhyme;  and  I  need  make  no  further  mention  of 
it  as  distinct  therefrom. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  rhyme  is  not  an  essential 
of  verse.  The  existence  of  a  large  body  of  unrhymed  verse 
is  proof  positive  of  this  fact.  When  rhyme  does  appear, 
however,  it  is  invariably  found  either  at  the  end  of  the 
phrase  or  where  the  phrase  would  normally  be  expected 
to  end.  In  this  position  the  repetition  of  tone-color  which 
it  furnishes  "at  once  attracts  attention  and  tends  to  be- 
come a  structural  element  because  of  its  vividness  in  the 
total  effect."  By  furnishing  a  well-defined  refrain  and  by 
binding  the  phrases  together  in  groups  or  pairs,  it  enters 
into  the  rhythmic  structure.  Further,  it  makes  the  pause 
more  flexible  and  aids  in  producing  a  feeling  of  continuous 
flow.  By  correlating  phrases  it  builds  stanza  units  and 
makes  possible  the  control  of  the  larger  structural  move- 
ments. Both  accent  and  expressional  changes  are  forced 
by  it  to  conform  to  a  stricter  type  than  is  otherwise  attain- 
able.* In  those  instances  in  which  rhyme  does  not  occur 
at  the  end  of  the  phrase,  its  presence  is  more  or  less  ob- 
scured. In  fact,  I  can  recall  poem  after  poem  by  Robert 
Browning  which  might  as  well  have  omitted  the  rhyme 
altogether  as  far  as  its  being  heard  is  concerned.  In  music 
rhyme  is  not  of  value  unless  the  rhyming  syllables  are  sung 
upon  the  same  pitch.  R.  H.  Stetson,  too,  has  felt  the 
uselessness  of  rhyme  in  words  to  be  set  to  music,  and,  after 
having  conducted  a  series  of  experiments  to  aid  him  in 
clarifying  his  judgment,  has  expressed  himself  quite  per- 
tinently to  this  effect:  — 

1  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  464. 


RHYME  AND  THE  LINE  163 

"Definite  pitch  relations  in  music  seem  to  make  rhjmie  of  little 
significance.  We  seldom  notice  the  rhymes  in  a  hymn  or  in  a  song 
of  any  musical  worth.  In  comic  operas  and  popular  ditties  rhyme 
does  now  and  then  figure.  In  such  cases  the  pitch  of  the  two  or 
more  rhyming  syllables  is  identical;  often  the  whole  phrase  is 
repeated  for  each  rhyming  verse.  A  few  experiments  in  singing 
a  rhyme  to  simple  intervals  show  that  when  the  identical  interval 
is  used  the  two  syllables  rhyme  well,  but  if  the  interval  be  in  the 
opposite  direction,  or  in  another  chord,  the  rhyme  is  very  uncer- 
tain. It  seems  that  in  music  we  usually  have  'feelings  of  expecta- 
tion' (i.e.,  tension  of  some  sort,  central  or  peripheral),  which  are 
adequate  to  unite  the  phrases  into  larger  unities."  ^ 

Since  rhyme,  then,  to  be  of  value  must  occur  at  the  end 
of  the  phrase  in  verse,  the  question  as  to  its  periodicity  is 
answered  by  an  examination  of  the  time-length  of  the  phrase. 

It  should  be  remembered  that  phrasing,  although  neces- 
sitated by  the  impossibility  of  speaking  continuously,  has 
but  one  object  in  view,  —  the  grouping  together  of  words 
that  logically  belong  together.  If,  therefore,  any  other 
phenomenon  can  perform  the  same  function  as  the  pause, 
that  phenomenon  may  sometimes  either  obviate  the  ap- 
pearance of  the  pause  or  shorten  it.  Accordingly  we  find 
exactly  this  taking  place  in  those  forms  of  verse  in  which 
rhyme  is  present.  Here  again  the  experiments  of  Stetson 
are  productive  of  important  results,  which  he  summarizes 
as  follows :  — 

"There  are  wide,  isolated  variations  as  in  the  case  of  unrhymed 
material.  As  compared  with  unrhymed  verse,  the  pause  is  gen- 
erally decidedly  shorter.  The  verse  pauses  of  the  feminine 
rhjones  are  generally  much  like  those  of  the  rhymed  material. 
But  there  are  very  few  cases  of  the  verse  pause  being  as  short  as 
the  foot  pause  —  only  four  cases  in  sixty  (6.6  per  cent.). 

1  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  431. 


164     THE  FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

"The  wide  variation  of  the  verse  pause  and  its  occasional 
equivalence  of  the  foot  pause  in  rhymed  verses  is  in  accord  with  the 
notion  that  the  rhyme  in  some  way  brings  the  verse  to  a  close 
by  a  process  more  rapid  than  that  in  unrhymed  material."  ^ 

We  have  already  seen  the  time  lengths  between  the  pharsal- 
pauses,  which  are  here  identical  with  the  verse-pauses,  to 
be  widely  variable  when  judged  by  any  small  unit  such  as 
a  thirtieth  or  a  fortieth  of  a  second.  Hence,  I  believe  I 
am  not  overstepping  the  mark  in  saying  that,  as  in  the  case 
of  the  phrase,  the  occurrence  of  rhyme  alone  is  not  suffi- 
ciently periodic  in  character  to  establish  a  rhythm.  Like 
alliteration,  rhyme  is  certainly  a  decided  aid  to  accent.  It 
occurs  only  in  accented  syllables;  and,  wherever  it  falls, 
the  accent  is  made  more  conspicuous.^  Therefore,  because 
of  its  appearance  as  an  adjunct  to  accent,  and  because 
it  usually  either  precedes  a  pause  or  is  itself  accepted  in 
lieu  of  a  pause,  it  furnishes  a  very  salient  feature  upon 
which  to  centre  the  attention;  but,  I  repeat,  it  is  in  no  wise 
essential  to  verse.  In  fact,  when  it  becomes  too  conspic- 
uous, it  may  even  cause  so  decided  a  jingle  as  to  make  its 
presence  more  of  a  blemish  than  an  ornament. 

While  I  am  piling  up  negative  evidence,  although  its 
consideration  at  this  point  involves  somewhat  of  a  reversal 
of  the  method  of  procedure  I  have  been  following,  I  can  not 
leave  the  discussion  of  the  larger  units  of  verse  without 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  449. 

2  Ibid.,  pp.  449-453. 

Consult  the  following  authorities  as  to  the  relation  of  tone  quality 
to  rhythm :  — 

Squire:  "Genetic  Study  of  Rhythm,"  American  Journal  of  Psy- 
chology, XII.,  1901,  p.  558. 

Macdougall:  Psychological  Remeio  Monographs  Supplement,  IV.,  1903, 
Harvard  Psychological  Studies,  I.,  p.  317. 

Woodrow:  "Role  of  Pitch  in  Rhythm,"  note  at  the  bottom  of  page  62. 


RHYME  AND  THE  LINE  165 

attacking  the  problem  of  the  line  as  an  essential  factor  in 
verse  structure.  Not  a  few  prosodists,  believing  the  foot 
to  be  common  to  both  verse  and  prose,  have  claimed  that 
the  essential  difference  between  the  two  forms  lies  in  the 
employment  by  verse  of  feet  in  such  a  manner  as  to  form 
lines.  Professor  Charles  M.  Gayley  expresses  it  thus: 
"Metre,  or  measure,  as  the  word  signifies,  marks  off  the 
current  of  rhythm  into  artificial  divisions,  each  of  which 
is  a  line  or  verse.  Metre  regulates  the  number  of  feet  in 
verse;  and  with  the  end  of  one  verse  or  'turn'  the  rhythm 
begins  another."  ^  Leaving,  for  the  time  being,  the  ques- 
tion of  the  foot  out  of  consideration,  it  devolves  upon  me 
to  show,  therefore,  that  the  writing  of  verse  in  lines  is  a 
perfectly  arbitrary  matter  and  that  verse  is  essentially  verse 
whether  it  be  written  in  lines  of  a  determined  length  or 
written  continuously  just  as  in  the  case  of  prose. 

In  the  first  place,  the  oldest  Anglo-Saxon  monuments 
disclose  no  difference  between  the  forms  of  writing  for  prose 
and  the  form  of  writing  for  verse;  yet  I  do  not  see  how  one 
could  fail  before  reading  very  far  to  perceive  that  there  is 
a  difference  between  the  verse  and  the  prose.  In  order 
to  make  this  difference  more  readily  apparent  to  the  eye, 
and  thus  to  aid  in  the  reading  of  verse  as  verse  in  contra- 
distinction to  prose,  later  manuscripts  show  a  breaking  up 
of  the  continuous  flow  of  the  earlier  lines  into  shorter  lines 
at  the  end  of  each  of  which  a  pause  normally  occurs.  In 
the  middle  of  each  of  these  lines  a  pause  of  less  duration 
than  the  pause  at  the  end  of  the  line  is  found.  The  two 
hemistiches  might  just  as  well  have  been  written,  as  some- 
times they  were,  on  separate  lines,  except  that,  on  account 
of  their  being  linked  by  alliteration,  they  are  read  with 

^  Gayley  and  Young:  " English  Poetry :  Its  Principles  and  Progress," 
p.  liv.  (Macmillan,  1908). 


166     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

greater  ease  when  written  on  the  same  hne.  Writing 
them  thus  is  merely  a  convention  adopted  for  greater  con- 
venience. Yet,  after  all,  it  is  nothing  more  than  a  con- 
vention, not  an  essential. 

Many  a  time  have  I  written  out  as  prose  some  of  the 
very  finest  passages  from  Shakespeare,  and  then  asked 
my  friends  to  arrange  the  verse  into  lines.  Even  after  I 
had  explained  to  them  that  the  verse  was  iambic  pentam- 
eter, very  seldom  were  they  able  to  put  into  each  line 
the  same  words  as  written  there  by  the  standard  editions. 
Of  course,  I  had  to  be  careful  to  select  passages  that  did 
not  begin  with  the  first  foot  of  the  line.  In  hearing  blank 
verse  that  is  not  end-stopped,  I  do  not  believe  that  any 
one  is  able  to  determine  by  ear  alone  where  the  lines  begin 
or  where  they  end.  I  certainly  can  not  do  it;  and  I  think 
that  rightfully  I  may  lay  claim  to  a  more  tolerable  ear  than 
is  necessary  for  the  appreciation  of  the  tong  and  bones. 

Poets  themselves  are  at  times  decidedly  doubtful  as  to 
what  linear  arrangement  they  should  give  to  their  poems. 
Practically  every  editor  of  old  manuscript  sooner  or  later 
has  to  face  the  problem  as  to  which  of  two  or  more  forms 
he  should  present  to  the  public  when  the  poet  has  been  so 
careless  as  to  leave  several  metrical  arrangements  of  the 
same  poem.  Poe  certainly  sanctioned  by  publication  two 
such  writings  of  "Annabel  Lee";  and  I  defy  any  one  from 
hearing  the  two  read  to  determine  which  is  which. 

Where  the  pause  falls  in  the  middle  of  the  line  and  again 
at  the  end  of  the  line,  the  poem  may  be  written  just  as 
conveniently  in  two  lines  as  in  one.  The  fact  that  either 
the  pause  or  the  rhyme  comes  so  frequently  at  the  end  of 
the  line  causes  the  line  to  be  looked  upon  as  the  unit.  This, 
it  seems  to  me,  is  largely  responsible  for  the  misconception 
which  has  arisen.  But  the  line  itself  is  not  the  unit.  The 
unit  is  to  be  found  in  the  phrase,  of  which  either  the  pause 


RHYME  AND  THE  LINE  167 

or  the  rhyme  marks  the  end,  and  for  the  more  ready  per- 
ception of  which  by  the  reader  the  division  into  Hnes  takes 
place.  To  the  hearer  and  to  the  one  reciting  from  memory 
the  Hnes  are  nonexistent.  It  is  easy  enough  for  an  inar- 
tistic reader  so  to  read  verse  as  to  give  it  the  sound  of  prose ; 
and  writing  it  in  hnes  will  not  alter  the  matter.  Of  course,, 
I  do  not  pretend  to  say  that  seeing  a  passage  written  in 
lines  does  not  indicate  to  the  person  about  to  interpret  it 
that  he  has  before  him  a  piece  of  verse  and  that  he  should, 
therefore,  read  it  as  verse  and  not  as  prose.  However, 
if  the  capacity  for  being  read  as  verse  did  not  rest  in  the 
words  themselves,  no  possible  method  of  writing  them 
could  enable  the  reader  to  make  verse  of  them.  Where 
the  phrase  and  the  line  end  together,  the  line  is  an  aid  to 
the  reader;  where  the  phrase  ends  within  the  line  or  over- 
laps from  line  to  line,  the  arrangement  of  the  words  in 
lines  of  a  set  length  is  purely  arbitrary;  and  more  often 
than  not  by  confusing  the  reader  it  actually  destroys  for 
him  the  very  feeling  of  rhythmical  unity  which  it  is  sup- 
posed to  necessitate.  Prose,  verse,  and  music  are  con- 
tinuous in  their  flow.  All  such  devices  as  writing  them  in 
lines  and  supplying  them  with  various  marks  of  punctua- 
tion are  entirely  aside  from  their  structure.  These  are 
guide-posts  and  nothing  more;  and  they  are  of  value  only 
as  they  assist  the  reader  in  his  effort  to  make  a  logical  group- 
ing of  his  words.  In  verse  the  logical  group  is  also  the 
rhythmical  group,  whether  the  grouping  is  indicated  by 
any  form  of  punctuation  or  not. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE    STRUCTURE    OF    THE    FOOT:    ACCENT,    DURATION, 

AND    PITCH    IN    THE    GENERAL    PROCESS    OF    TIME 

SYNTHESIS 

There  yet  remains  to  be  considered  a  final  point  of  the 
greatest  possible  weight  in  leading  to  a  clarified  view  of 
the  nature  of  verse.  Until  now  I  have  raised  no  question 
as  to  the  structure  of  the  foot,  or  bar,  or  measure;  and  I 
have  spoken  of  iamb  and  trochee  and  the  other  feet  quite 
after  the  orthodox  fashion  and  without  once  taking  the 
trouble  to  define  the  meaning  of  these  terms.  Even  now 
I  shall  not  undertake  to  present  the  views  of  the  proso- 
dists.  Instead  I  must  turn  again  to  the  psychologists 
and  in  interpreting  the  data  afforded  by  their  experiments 
try  to  construct  a  theory  more  in  accordance  with  fact  than 
any  hitherto  propounded.  In  this  last  act  of  demolition 
I  am  at  the  same  time  beginning  to  build  anew. 

Dr.  Herbert  Woodrow  in  presenting  to  his  subjects  rhyth- 
mical stimuli  used  an  alternation  of  two  sounds  of  equal 
intensity  but  of  unequal,  though  constant  length,  of  which 
the  duration  of  the  longer  sound  was  .09  second,  of  the 
shorter  .06.  "The  total  number  of  series  of  minimal 
changes  used  in  this  investigation,"  says  he,^  "was  about 
24,000.  The  indifference  point  in  this  series  is  taken  as 
the  point  at  which  the  interval  after  the  longer  sound  is 
.53  second."     In  the  following  table  after  means  the  dura- 

1  "  A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  pp.  27-28. 
168 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  169 

tion  of  the  interval  after  the  longer  sound;  before,  the 
duration  of  the  interval  before  the  longer  sound.  Both 
are  expressed  in  seconds. 


After 

Before 

Subject's  judgments 

.61 

—    .39 

—                 iambic 

.59 

—     .41 

—                 iambic 

.57 

—       .43 

iambic 

.55 

—         .45 

iambic 

.53 

—           .47 

—                staccato 

.51 

—             .49 

—                trochaic 

.49 

—               .51 

—                trochaic 

.47 

—                 .53 

—                trochaic 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  he  began  with  a  rhythm  in  which 
the  shorter  sound  was  distinctly  felt  to  be  grouped  with 
the  longer  sound  which  followed  it,  —  that  is,  it  was  felt 
as  an  iambic  rhythm.  By  gradually  changing  the  time 
intervals  between  the  longer  and  the  shorter  sounds,  he 
reached  a  point  at  which  no  grouping  at  all  seemed  to  take 
place.  This  indifference  point  once  having  been  passed, 
however,  the  order  of  grouping  became  reversed  and  the 
shorter  time  length  now  appeared  to  be  grouped  with  the 
longer  length  preceding  it  instead  of  with  the  one  follow- 
ing, —  that  is,  the  rhythm  became  trochaic.  At  the  in- 
difference point  a  very  slight  change  in  one  direction  or  the 
other  reversed  the  order  of  the  grouping. 

The  next  experiment  involved  a  series  of  alternate  loud 
and  soft  sounds,  each  0.13  second  in  duration,  and  the 
duration  of  the  time  interval  from  the  beginning  of  one 
loud  sound  to  the  beginning  of  the  following  loud  sound  1.5 
second.  The  loud  sound  was  audible  to  the  distance  of 
136  feet,  the  soft  to  24.  This  time  the  objective  stimuli 
were  given  in  irregular  order. 


170     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

Intervals  before  and  after 

the  louder  sound,   in  seconds.        Subject's  judgments   (per  cent) 

Trochaic     Doubtful        Iambic     N 


before 

After 

.66 

.57 

.62 

.62 

.59 

.64 

.67 

.66 

.55 

.68 

.53 

.70 

.49 

.74 

100.0 

0.0 

0.0 

26 

85.7 

14.3 

0.0 

42 

71.4 

28.6 

0.0 

56 

31.3 

59.4 

9.3 

64 

0.0 

16.0 

84.0 

50 

0.0 

5.5 

94.5 

54 

0.0 

0.0 

100.0 

36 

The  rhythm  indifference  point  lies  very  close  to  the 
figures  I  have  written  in  italics. 

"It  will  be  observed,"  says  Woodrow,^  "...  that  a  change  by 
one  step  from  this  point  is  sufficient  to  make  the  judgment  in  over 
70  per  cent,  of  the  cases  either  iambic  or  trochaic  depending  upon 
the  direction  of  the  change.  Moreover,  in  this  case,  as  in  others 
with  the  same  and  other  subjects,  the  results  obtained  by  this 
method  (constant  stimuli)  agree  very  closely  with  those  obtained 
by  the  method  of  minimal  changes." 

In  further  experiments  in  which  the  duration  of  all  the 
sounds  was  kept  constant  and  equal,  in  which  the  time- 
interval  from  louder  sound  to  louder  sound  remained  un- 
changed, and  in  which  all  the  louder  sounds  were  of  the 
same  intensity  and  all  the  shorter  of  the  same  intensity,  it 
was  obvious  that  "the  effect  of  accent  is  to  cause  the  ac- 
cented sound  to  appear  to  be  grouped  with  the  following 
weaker  sound  .  .  .,  and  that  the  rhythm  becomes  more  and 
more  trochaic  as  the  ratio  between  the  intensities  of  the 
louder  and  weaker  sounds  increases.  It  is  further  obvious 
that  the  trochaism  of  the  series  increases  at  first  very  rapidly 
and  later  very  slowly  relative  to  the  increase  in  distance 

1  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  28. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  171 

to  which  the  louder  sound  is  just  audible,  the  weaker  re- 
maining constant.  .  .  .  All  subjects  frequently  remarked 
on  the  greater  apparent  duration  of  the  louder  sound.  The 
difference  both  in  loudness  and  duration  seemed  greater 
when  the  rhythm  was  pronounced  than  when  near  the 
indifference  point."  ^ 

Writing  on  "The  Role  of  Pitch  in  Rhythm," 2  Dr.  Wood- 
row  reiterates  this  opinion  with  but  slight  alteration :  — 

"I  have  often  found  that  making  every  second  sound  longer 
and  louder  may  bring  about  the  perception  of  a  very  strong  tro- 
chaic rh5rthm,  one  in  which  the  longer  and  louder  sound  begins 
the  group.'  The  result  that  will  be  obtained  depends  upon  the 
direction  and  magnitude  of  the  effect  produced  by  the  particular 
intensity  and  duration  used,  when  each  is  acting  alone.  This, 
in  turn,  depends  upon  a  large  number  of  factors,  including  both  the 
absolute  and  relative  duration  of  the  sounds  composing  the  rhyth- 
mical series."  —  (p.  55-56.) 

"Squire  found  that  when  she  presented  an  exceedingly  even- 
spaced  series  of  sounds  of  equal  intensity  and  duration,  in  which 
every  second  or  every  third  was  of  a  different  pitch  from  the  others, 
that  the  subjects,  though  only  seven  in  number,  fell  into  three 
classes,  —  those  who  accented  the  high  tones,  those  who  accented 
the  low,  and  those  to  whom  highness  and  lowness  were  a  matter 
of  indifference.*  Squire  concludes  from  her  experiments  that 
pitch  has  a  great  effectiveness  as  a  determinant  of  rhythm."^  Yet 
Woodrow  considers  that  "pitch  cannot  in  the  case  of  a  single 
subject  be  a  reliable  or  constant  determinant  of  rhythm."  ® 

In  no  form  of  art  with  which  I  am  acquainted  is  there 
the  slightest  thought  of  making  pitch  a  determinant  of 

1  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  pp.  32-33. 

*  Psychological  Review,  Jan.,  1911,  Vol.  XVIII.,  No.  1,  54. 
^  See  Archives  of  Psychology,  XIV.,  1909,  Table  VI.,  p.  36. 

*  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  XII.,  1901,  p.  556. 
5  Ibid.,  pp.  549-558. 

«  Woodrow:  "The  Role  of  Pitch  in  Rhythm,"  p.  59. 


172  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

rhythm.  In  music  pitch  may  sometimes  be  one  in  many 
concomitant  factors  assisting  in  the  estabhshment  of  a 
rhythm;  but  Shaw  and  Wrinch  ^  are  right  in  saying  that 
the  length  of  a  time-interval  is  unaffected  by  pitch;  and 
Sears,^  too,  quite  correctly  affirms  that  the  pitch  of  the 
tones  has  "no  effect  on  the  relative  length  given  to  intervals 
by  the  performing  musician."  Yet  I  think  that  Dr.  Wood- 
row  is  pressing  the  matter  much  too  far  when  he  declares : 

"Pitch,  intensity,  and  duration  can  no  longer  be  looked  upon 
as  stellvertretende  factors,  any  one  of  which  may  be  substituted  for 
either  of  the  other  two.  The  role  of  each  in  rhythm  is  radically 
different.  Intensity  has  a  group-beginning  effect:  duration,  a 
group-ending  effect:  pitch,  neither  a  group-ending  nor  a  group- 
beginning  effect." ' 

In  a  language  in  which  the  centroids  are  at  all  times  made 
up  of  intensity,  duration,  pitch,  and  tone-color,  and  in 
which  first  one  type  of  centroid  and  then  another  is  used 
without  the  least  regard  to  the  preeminence  of  any  partic- 
ular type,  it  seems  to  me,  that,  granting  the  opposite 
grouping  effects  attributable  to  intensity  and  to  duration, 
and  the  purely  negative  effect  attributable  to  pitch,  the 
several  types  of  centroids  are  still  interchangeable,  and  that 
once  a  particular  form  of  grouping  has  been  estabhshed, 
it  will  persist  even  though  an  entirely  different  type  of 
centroid  should  appear  with  a  moderate  degree  of  fre- 
quency. Upon  reflecting,  that  the  centroid  is  predomi- 
nantly a  matter  of  intensity;  that,  where  intensity  is  the 
determining  factor  of  grouping,  the  more  intense  sound 
tends  to  begin  the  group;  and,  that,  although  agreeable- 
ness  is  not  a  conditional  test  for  rhythm,  a  trochaic  type 

1  University  of  Toronto  Studies,  Psychological  Series,  1899. 

2  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  1902,  p.  33. 

»  Woodrow:  "The  Role  of  Pitch  in  Rhythm,"  p.  77. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  173 

of  rhythm  "gives  greater  satisfaction  than  an  iambic,"  ^ 
I  am  more  and  more  firmly  convinced  of  the  interchange- 
ableness  of  the  types  of  centroids,  especially  as  I  believe 
rhythm  to  be  less  a  matter  of  judgment  than  a  feeling  due 
to  an  active  functioning  of  the  physiological  or  neural 
substrate.  The  case  seems  to  me  to  be  all  the  stronger  for 
Oliver's  observation  that  the  stress  of  the  accented  sylla- 
ble of  the  iambus  brings  into  greater  prominence  the  sounds 
meant  to  be  stressed  than  does  the  trochee.^  He  found 
exactly  the  same  to  hold  true  for  groups  of  three  sounds 
under  conditions  of  experimentation  similar  to  those  em- 
ployed for  groups  of  two,  so  that  what  has  been  affirmed 
of  the  iambic-trochaic  movement  is  equally  true  of  the 
anapaestic-dactylic . 

"The  prolongation  of  the  foot  pause  makes  of  the  dactyl  a 
modified  trochee.  The  amphibrach  laid  out  on  this  scheme  would 
coincide  with  the  dactyl,  as  there  are  but  three  possible  zones  for 
foot  elements:  the  zone  of  the  limiting  sensation  (always  occupied 
by  the  accented  syllable),  the  zone  of  the  contraction  phase 
(occupied  by  the  unaccented  syllables  of  the  iamb  and  anapaest), 
and  the  zone  of  the  relaxation  phase  (occupied  by  the  unaccented 
syllable  of  the  trochee  and  the  middle  syllable  of  the  dactyl)."  ^ 

In  the  next  series  of  experiments  "the  absolute  duration 
of  the  measure  and  of  all  its  parts,  intervals  and  sounds, 
was  varied,  while  all  relative  durations  were  kept  constant," 
as,  too,  were  kept  the  intensities  of  the  sounds.  Where 
every  second  sound  is  the  louder,  "the  subjects  perceived 
the  sounds  in  groups  of  two  except  for  the  measures  whose 

^  Wallin:    "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and  Time,"  pp.  9-15. 

2  Gilver:  "The  Psycho-physiological  Effects  of  the  Elements  of 
Speech  in  Relation  to  Poetry,"  Psychological  Monographs  of  Harvard 
University,  Vol.  XIX.,  No.  2,  April,  1915,  p.  7  (Psychological  Review 
Co.,  Lancaster,  Pa.). 

5  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  461. 


174     THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

total  duration  is  .  .  .  .75  or  .5  second.  At  these  last-men- 
tioned rates,  the  sounds  were  grouped  by  four  so  that  as  a 
matter  of  fact  at  these  two  rates  the  total  duration  of  the 
groups  was  twice  that  indicated  ...  as  the  duration  of  the 
measure."  ^  The  conclusions  which  may  be  drawn  from 
these  experiments  on  the  rates  at  which  rhythms  are  pre- 
sented to  consciousness  Woodrow  summarizes  as  follows:  — 

"Within  certain  limits  the  degree  of  temporal  segregation  pre- 
sented by  the  groups  remains  very  nearlj^  constant.  With  slower 
rates  the  rhythm  entirely  or  almost  entirely  disappears.  The 
limits  within  which  the  degree  of  temporal  segregation  remains 
relatively  constant  vary  with  individuals  and  with  the  nature  of 
the  objective  series.  .  .  .  From  a  rate  of  1.0  second  for  one  measure 
up  to  a  rate  of  between  4.0  and  7.0  seconds  for  one  measure,  the 
degree  of  rh3^hm  remains  about  constant.  .  .  .  There  is  some 
indication,  however,  that  with  rates  faster  than  1.0  second  for 
one  measure  there  is  a  marked  increase  in  the  amount  of  temporal 
segregation  presented  by  the  rhythm.  .  .  .  Inasmuch  as  sub- 
jective rhythm  comes  in  very  markedly  at  rates  of  about  1  second 
for  two  beats  or  faster,  the  increase  above  noted  in  the  rhythmical 
effect  for  the  faster  rates  can  hardly  be  regarded  as  the  effect  of 
an  increase  in  rate  on  the  rhythmical  effect  of  intensity  or  duration. 
It  seems  rather  that  we  have  in  the  case  of  these  rates  a  subjective 
factor  which  is  more  or  less  independent  of  any  differences  which 
may  prevail  in  the  intensity  or  duration  of  the  sounds  composing 
the  series,  since  at  these  rates  grouping  occurs  when  all  the  sounds 
are  equal  both  in  intensity  and  duration."  ^ 

Wallin  gives  an  interesting  tabulation  of  the  rates  which 
Viderot,  Wundt,  Stevens,  Johnson,  Meumann,  and  Bolton 
consider  as  most  favorable  for  rhythmizing  a  series.^    Need- 

1  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  34. 

2  Woodrow:   "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  pp.  36-37. 
Consult  also  Meumann  {Phil.  Stud.,  X.,  p.  302,  1894)  and  Shaw  and 

Wrinch  (p.  19). 

*  Wallin:  "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and  Time,"  Psycho. 
Review,  May,  1911,  XVIII.,  No.  3,  pp.  211-212. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  175 

less  to  say  they  are  all  different.  "Persons  who  chiefly 
enjoy  the  melody  and  harmony  in  music  will  favor  medium 
or  slow  tempos,"  says  Wallin/  "and  those  who  prefer  the 
rhythm  will  select  fast  tempos."  I  can  agree  with  him 
still  further  in  saying:  "The  fact  that  fast  and  slow  rates 
are  found  in  all  grades  indicates  that  the  preference,  or 
the  vigor  of  the  response,  is  not  dependent  entirely  upon  the 
tempo.  The  catchiness  and  familiarity  of  the  music,  the 
distinctness  or  incisiveness  of  the  accent,  and  the  character 
of  the  measure  are  also  important  factors."  ^  Those  who 
have  observed  the  satisfaction  with  which  a  good  reader 
lingers  over  the  words  of  some  beautiful  passage  in  com- 
parison with  the  energetic  jingle  which  children  give  to 
"Mother  Goose"  will  appreciate  the  appositeness  in  respect 
to  verse  of  these  remarks  on  the  tempos  of  music. 

After  other  experiments  equally  as  painstaking  as  those 
already  cited.  Dr.  Woodrow  makes  several  generalizations 
which  seem  to  me  both  accurate  and  pertinent.  Let  me 
quote  them: 

"The  strongest  trochaic  which  it  is  possible  to  produce  by 
duration  changes  alone,  therefore,  is  produced  when  the  longer 
sound  is  longer,  but  only  very  slightly  so,  than  the  shorter  sound. 
It  may  be  that  the  trochaic  rhjdihm  of  the  smaller  ratios  was  due 
chiefly  to  the  difference  in  apparent  loudness  between  the  longer 
and  the  shorter  sounds."  ^ 

"The  effect  of  intensity  is  to  make  the  longer  sound  begin  the 
measure,  an  effect  which  may  be  spoken  of  as  trochaic,  whereas 
the  effect  of  duration,  as  such,  is  to  make  the  longer  sound  end 
the  measure,  which  usuaUy  means  an  iambic  effect."  * 

1  Ibid.,  p.  216. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  212. 

'  Woodrow:  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  46. 

See  also  Hurst  and  McKay  (p.  70)  and  R.  H.  Stetson  (p.  443). 

*  Ibid.,  p.  46. 


176  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

"The  longer  sound  should  naturally  appear  the  louder,  as  we 
DMght  say,  for  sensory  reasons,  apart  from  more  complicated  or 
more  central  processes.  .  .  .  When  the  longer  sound  appears  the 
louder,  there  is  no  necessity  for  considering  this  as  due  to  greater 
attention  directed  to  the  longer.  On  the  contrary,  the  shorter 
might  be  receiving  the  greater  amount  of  attention  and  yet  not 
appear  as  loud  as  the  longer,  the  physiological  or  sensory  effect 
exerted  by  duration  on  intensity  being  able  to  swamp  the  slight 
effect  of  the  central  process  on  intensity,  in  case  the  two  processes 
work  in  opposition."  ^ 

"  There  is  some  ground  ...  for  the  conclusion  that  usually  the 
intervals  which  are  most  important  in  deciding  what  will  be  the 
nature  of  the  rhythmical  impression  are  the  intervals  between 
the  end  of  one  sound  and  the  beginning  of  the  following.  But,  in 
the  case  of  Ws,  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  rhythm  was  more 
closely  allied  to  the  process  of  comparing  the  intervals  between 
the  beginnings  of  the  sounds  than  to  that  of  the  comparison  of 
the  actual  silent  intervals."  ^ 

Stetson  thinks  that  the  function  of  stimuli  during  the 
movement  cycle  varies  with  the  position  of  the  stimulus 
in  that  cycle,  and  that  this  offers  a  possible  explanation  of 
the  striking  peculiarities  of  the  unit  groups. 

"The  iamb  (w  _;_)  and  the  trochee  (_/_  w)  should  be  quite  alike 
for  a  general  synthesizing  process;  but  not  only  is  the  experi- 
mental character  of  the  two  entirely  unhke,  but  the  ratio  between 
their  intervals  is  entirely  different."  ^ 

1  Woodrow:    "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  41. 

For  further  confirmation  of  this  point  consult :  — 

Meyer:  "Beitrage  zur  deutschen  Metrik,"  Neuere  Sprachen,  1898, 
VI.,  pp.  136-138. 

Bolton:  "Rhythm,"  American  Journal  of  Psychology,  1893,  VI., 
p.  222. 

Meumann:  "  Untersuchungen  zur  Psyehologie  und  Aesthetik  des 
Rhythmus,"  Philosophische  Studien,  1894,  X.,  p.  303. 

^  "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  51. 

»  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  pp.  460-461. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  177 

To  this  he  adds: 

"It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  unaccented  element  of  the 
trochee  comes  at  the  earher  part  of  the  relaxation  phase,  where 
it  must  intensify  the  relaxation  process,  and  tend  to  shorten  the 
total  length  of  the  cycle.  This  may  be  the  reason  for  its  pecuhar 
buoyant,  vigorous,  and  non-final  character.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  unaccented  element  of  the  iamb  occurs  at  a  point  where  it 
may  initiate  and  intensify  the  contraction,  which  gives  the  hmit- 
ing  sensation;  it  is,  therefore,  more  closely  bound  to  the  hmiting 
sensation  and  has  the  character  of  intensifying  the  beat."  ^ 

Still  other  investigators,  using  different  methods  and  not 
at  all  concerned  about  determining  the  difference  between 
iamb  and  trochee  or  anapaest  and  dactyl,  have  noted  the 
tendency  of  the  one  to  pass  into  the  other  and  the  apparent 
interchangeability  of  the  two.^    Says  Wallin: 

"There  is  no  physical  distinction  between  the  several  types  of 
the  different  modes  of  distribution.  There  may  be  a  mental,  or 
felt,  difference  between  the  iambus  and  the  trochee,  and  the  ana- 
paest and  the  dactyl;  but  physical  measurements  of  them  always 
extend  from  centroid  to  centroid,  independently  of  type  differ- 
ences. The  modes  of  distribution  are,  upon  the  whole,  the  same 
in  prose  and  poetry."  ^ 

Every  one  in  the  least  familiar  with  the  structure  of 
verse  has  met  with  innumerable  instances  of  iambuses 
occurring  in  the  midst  of  trochees  and  vice  versa;  and  any 
one  who  knows  the  least  thing  about  the  English  dactyl 
is  sadly  conscious  of  its  inability  to  sustain  itself,  —  so 
much  so  that  some  prosodists  have  denied  the  existence  of 
the  dactyl  in  English  verse.     When  to  this  is  added  the 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:    "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  461. 

2  Shaw  and  Wrinch,  p.  53;  R.  C.  Gilver,  p.  13;  R.  H.  Stetson,  p.  440. 
'  J.  E.  Wallace  Wallin:    "Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech," 

p.  113. 


178     THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

testimony  of  the  psychologists  from  whom  I  have  quoted 
thus  freely,  I  can  not  believe  that  there  is  any  essential 
difference  between  the  various  kinds  of  feet.  As  I  have 
taken  occasion  to  remark  once  before,  these  units  are  not 
like  chips  of  mosaic  that  can  be  brought  together  to  form  a 
tone  picture.  Unless  they  were  intimately  and  vitally 
related  to  each  other  upon  some  general  principle  of  greater 
cohesiveness  than  mere  chance  juxtaposition,  verse  would 
be  without  form  and  void;  and  its  parts  would  fall  asunder 
as  speedily  as  a  mosaic  when  the  matrix  is  broken.  Al- 
though I  am  painfully  aware,  that,  in  attempting  to  bring 
to  light  the  reason  why  there  is  in  verse  this  capacity  for 
equivalence,  substitution,  and  juxtaposition  which  many 
eminent  prosodists  believe  to  exist  in  what  they  consider 
to  be  the  verse  unit,  I  am  courting  the  scorn  of  no  less  a 
person  than  Professor  George  Saintsbury,^  nevertheless, 
the  thanklessness  of  my  task  must  not  deter  me  from  seek- 
ing still  further  for  some  principle  which  will  not  only  untie 
the  hard  knot  of  confusion  in  the  thought  of  the  metrists, 
but  will  also  present  to  them  a  tangible  theory  by  means 
of  which  to  approach  the  study  of  the  structure  of  verse. 
From  the  mass  of  negative  information  which  thus  far  I 
have  presented,  I  must  now  deduce  certain  positive  and 
fundamental  facts  before  I  am  again  prepared  to  return 
to  a  consideration  of  the  foot.  Hoping  that  I  have  made 
manifest  what  do  not  constitute  the  essential,  differentiat- 
ing qualities  of  verse,  I  turn  to  those  facts  in  which  I  believe 
the  broader  and  deeper  truths  to  lie. 

It  is  a  matter  of  common  experience  that  judgments  of 
time  are  about  as  uncertain  as  judgments  upon  any  sub- 
ject could  well  be.^     If  we  are  highly  entertained,  the  hours 

^  George  Saintsbury:  "History  of  English  Prosody,"  Vol.  III.,, 
pp.  522-523  (Macmillan  and  Co.,  1910). 

2  V.  Benussi:  "Psychologie  der  Zeitauffassung,"  p.  505. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  179 

pass  very  rapidly.  There  are  some  moments  which  seem 
an  eternity.  A  period  of  time  during  which  nothing  hap- 
pens may  appear  to  be  infinitely  longer  than  the  same 
period  filled  to  the  brim.  Even  when  the  attention  is  en- 
tirely centered  upon  the  measuring  of  time,  except  within 
very  narrow  limits  accuracy  is  about  the  last  thing  to  be 
expected.     Says  Wallin: 

"The  perception  of  time  and  rhythm  are  closely  related  proc- 
esses/ but  they  are  not  identical,  even  in  the  elemental  per- 
ception of  time  differences.  A  temporal  grouping  is  obviously 
involved  in  rhythmical  grouping,  but  the  temporal  grouping  due 
to  grouping  by  segregation,  —  i.e.,  by  increasing  the  value  of  the 
preceding  interval  —  is  secondary.  The  primary  and  perhaps  the 
only  essential  conscious  datum  in  the  experience  of  the  rhythmiz- 
ing  subject  is  the  fairly  regular  alternation  of  intensity  differences 
(centroids)"  ^ 

"Time  differences  can  be  appreciated  relatively  better  than 
rhythm  differences  in  short  series.  To  secure  the  rhythmical 
swing  requires  a  longer  repetition  of  beats;  and  until  a  felt  rhyth- 
mical swing  is  obtained  the  discrimination  of  grades  of  rhythm  is 
not  maximally  effective." ' 

With  the  second  of  these  quotations  Dr.  Warner  Brown 
would  agree,  I  believe;  but  to  the  first  he  would  most 
assuredly  take  exception.  It  will  be  wiser  to  give  a  few 
quotations  from  him  before  I  comment  upon  either  attitude. 

"A  rhythm  is  temporal  in  so  far  as  there  is  any  return  of  similar 
features.  But  at  the  same  time  such  a  rhythm  wiU  also  be  ac- 
centual since  there  must  always  be  points  of  emphasis  whose  re- 
turn can  be  marked."  '' 

1  See,  too,  Woodrow:   "A  Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm,"  p.  50. 

2  "Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  and  Time,"  Psychological  Re- 
view, March,  1911,  XVIIL,  No.  2,  p.  117. 

3  WaUin:   Psychological  Review,  March,  1911,  XVIIL,  No.  2,  p.  118. 
*  Brown:  Psychological  Review,  XVIIL,  No.  5,  344. 


180      THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

"If  the  movements  or  sounds  vary  in  intensity  more  than  in 
duration  or  more  than  the  interval  separating  them,  I  submit 
that  rhythm  is  primarily  temporal."  ^ 

"It  is  in  the  temporal  structure  and  not  in  the  accentual  struc- 
ture that  we  find  the  greater  regularity.  If  the  fundamental 
regularity  does  reside  in  the  arrangement  of  the  parts  within  the 
units  rather  than  in  the  recurrence  of  the  units,  it  is  still  to  be 
sought  in  the  arrangement  of  the  parts  in  time.  In  any  event 
the  predominant  regularity  on  either  level  is  a  temporal  regularity."  * 

For  my  part,  I  doubt  exceedingly  that  it  is  possible  to 
determine  whether  the  greater  regularity  resides  in  the 
interval  between  centroids  or  in  the  temporal  relation- 
ships borne  by  the  centroid  syllables  to  the  non-centroid. 
I  believe  further  that  subjects  vary  greatly  in  their  feeling 
upon  this  point.  I  am  quite  sure  that  many  do  experience 
verse  rhythm  as  ''the  alternation  of  intensity  differences," 
while  others  feel  the  greater  regularity  to  be  in  the  S3dla- 
ble  lengths.  Usually  I  feel  temporal  regularity  in  both 
the  recurring  centroids  and  the  syllable  lengths;  yet  it  is 
simply  impossible  for  me  to  say  which  is  the  predominant 
element,  or  whether  intensity  or  duration  is  the  more  vari- 
able. Both  are  factors  in  my  consciousness  of  rhythm; 
but,  in  hearing  verse  as  in  producing  it,  I  am  totally  unable 
to  make  an  analysis  of  these  component  factors.  It  seems 
to  me  that  the  attempt  to  discriminate  in  such  instances 
partakes  of  the  nature  of  hairsplitting.  It  is  essential  that 
we  recognize  what  factors  are  involved;  but  I  can  not  see 
that  it  makes  any  difference  as  to  the  degree  of  preponder- 
ance, especially  as  sometimes  one,  sometimes  the  other  is 
uppermost.  To  this  extent  I  believe  Wallin  to  be  unques- 
tionably right: 

1  Brown:   Psychological  Review  XVIII,  No.  5,  p.  344. 
*  Brown:  Psychological  Review,  XVIII.,  No.  5,  p.  345. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  .   181 

"Absolute  periodic  or  regular  occurrences  are  not  essential  to 
the  appreciation  of  rhythm,  although  absolute  regularity  improves 
the  quahty  of  the  rhythmic  impression.  To  engender  a  feeling 
of  rhythm  always  requires  a  certain  amount  of  periodicity;  but 
the  margin  of  irregularity  is  quite  considerable."  ^ 

In  fact,  the  impression  of  rhythm  is  part  and  parcel  of 
the  experience  of  time.  In  prose,  verse,  and  music  it  is 
always  necessary  to  perceive  simultaneously  and  immedi- 
ately at  least  three  periodicities,  in  which  the  judging  of  each 
aids  in  the  judging  of  the  others.  Along  with  time-lengths 
of  sound  and  of  silence,  time-lengths  between  centroids,  and 
time-lengths  of  phrases  go  tone  qualities  and  pitches  that  are 
in  themselves  absorbing.  All  these  combined  have  a  mean- 
ing, a  thought  content,  which  in  prose,  verse,  and  vocal  music 
is  sometimes  so  overmastering  as  to  obscure  almost  every 
detail  of  form.  Even  pure  music  induces  moods  and  thoughts 
that  divert  the  attention  to  such  an  extent,  that,  though 
the  rhythmic  groups  are  still  immediately  perceived,  they 
are  crowded  out  of  the  forefront  of  consciousness  and  the 
actual  relationship  of  the  sounds  more  or  less  obliterated. 

With  this  in  mind  let  us  turn  once  more  to  some  of  the 
measurements  made  by  Wallin.^  The  figures  above  the 
syllables  give  their  time-lengths,  those  below  the  dashes 
the  values  of  the  silences.  In  the  first  and  the  second  illus- 
trations the  unit  of  measurement  is  1/40  of  a  second;  in 
the  third  and  the  fourth,  1/48. 


35  2         5234         9 

' My  bed is like a little boat; 

4        2  4       3  5  15 

1  Wallin:  Psych.  Rev.,  XVIII.,  No.  2,  p.  108. 
^  "  Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of  Speech." 


182   THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 


5  5  86         396         11 

Nurse puts me  in and  I  em bark." 

8  5  4  3 

-  (p.  25.) 

5  4          4          9              4            6           11 
II.     "Oh yet we trust that some how 

2  4         7  7  6  3  5 
5 

good 

9 

6  4         3         6         4         13       3        14 
Will  _  be  _  the  _  fi  _  nal  _  goal  _  of  _  HI." 

3  3  6      2  7  2       3 

-  (p.  25.) 


7  4  13  6  14  5         10    8 

III.     "  Take the joys and bear the sorrows. 

4  3  16  7  5         3 


3  7          11           6          6          4         7 
Shut those eyes, next life will open . ' ' 

5  6  14  6         6  ? 

-  (p.  26.) 

7     8        4  10  6     10       5        8 

IV.     "And  so no force, how ev er great,  — 

5         5  7  ?         7  12 

4  11         4     11  4         8    3         13 
Can  strain  —  a  cord,  —  how  ev  —  er  —  fine." 

6  7  4        7 

-(p.  27.) 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT  183 

I  have  already  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  the 
silences  between  the  syllables  were  too  brief  to  be  audible 
when  the  lines  were  spoken,  and  that  they  could  be  made 
audible  only  by  so  slowing  down  the  revolutions  of  the 
disc  to  such  a  degree  that  the  words  could  hardly  be 
heard  as  articulate  sounds.  When  spoken,  except  at  the 
end  of  phrases,  no  gaps  were  heard  between  the  sounds. 
The  syllable  and  the  silence  which  follows  it  were  heard 
as  a  continuous  sound.  It  is  to  be  observed,  that,  in  the 
first  selection,  for  instance,  except  for  the  pause  at  the  end 
of  the  phrase,  no  silence  is  longer  than  8/40  of  a  second. 
In  the  third  selection  the  longest  is  7/48  of  a  second.  Now, 
it  is  easily  seen  that  not  many  of  the  sounds  are  longer  than 
a  fifth  of  a  second,  and  that  most  of  them  fall  far  below  this 
fraction.  When  sound  and  silence  are  counted  together, 
the  lengths  of  the  centroid  syllables  in  the  first  line  of  the 
first  selection  are  only  9/40,  9/40,  3/40,  9/40.  The  dif- 
ference of  6/40  of  a  second  could  hardly  be  apparent  even 
if  numerous  distracting  influences  were  not  at  work  to  claim 
the  attention  and  confuse  the  judgment.  Of  course,  we 
do  recognize  that  some  syllables  are  longer  than  others; 
but  how  much  longer,  we  are  totally  incapable  of  saying. 
In  music,  too,  we  feel  that  a  quarter  note  is  longer  than  an 
eighth  note;  but,  unless  our  attention  is  called  especially 
to  it,  we  quite  overlook  the  fact  that  all  the  quarter  notes 
in  a  bar  are  not  receiving  the  same  time-value.  Even  then 
some  people  refuse  to  admit  the  truth  of  the  matter.  Hav- 
ing gotten  the  idea  that  all  quarter  notes  are  of  equal  value, 
they  insist  that,  if  in  a  particular  instance  two  quarter 
notes  are  not  given  the  same  length,  they  ought  to  be. 
They  forget  that  such  an  absolute  regularity  as  they  de- 
mand would  weary  the  listener  and  thus  make  impossible 
an  art  of  any  kind.  Only  the  child  mind  can  take  delight 
in  exact  repetitions;    and  we  know  how  quickly  the  child 


184     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

tires  of  whatever  it  is  doing,  and  wanders  from  one  thing 
to  another.  Art  can  accompHsh  its  ends  only  in  so  far 
as  it  is  able  to  create  impressions  which  can  be  sustained 
sufficiently  long  to  awaken  a  feeling  of  unity,  wholeness, 
completeness.  Absolute  regularity  of  any  kind,  in  be- 
coming too  great  a  strain  upon  both  the  producer  and  the 
hearer,  negatives  that  without  which  art  can  not  exist. 
Art  must  create  an  illusion  of  regularity  at  the  same  time 
that  it  eschews  absolute  regularity. 

For  the  building  of  prose,  verse,  and  vocal  music 
the  same  material  is  available,  —  syllables  and  silences. 
WTiat  shall  be  done  with  this  material  is  entirely  dependent 
upon  the  different  aims  which  the  three  forms  of  temporal 
art  have  in  view.  In  prose  the  intention  is  not  to  secure 
regularity,  but  to  escape  from  it.  If,  therefore,  the  same 
sjdlables  are  given  us  to  be  read,  as  prose  we  assume 
toward  them  a  different  attitude  from  that  w^hich  we 
would  assume  if  told  that  they  are  verse.  In  reading  them 
as  verse  we  deliberately  seek  to  prolong  the  syllables  and 
the  silences  and  to  give  them  a  regularity  of  occurrence 
which  we  should  not  otherwise  care  to  attain.  In  verse 
and  in  music  we  are  desirous  of  producing  by  means  of 
speech  sounds  an  impression  of  rhythm.  Although  not 
so  flexible  as  the  sounds  of  pure  music,  still,  syllables  are 
relatively  flexible,  so  that  we  are  able  to  bend  them  to  our 
uses.  A  reader  with  a  high  degree  of  interpretative  ability 
will  prolong  or  shorten  them  in  such  a  way  as  to  cause  them 
to  yield  an  impression  of  comparative  regularity,  while 
some  one  less  brilliantly  endowed  might  be  unable  to  get 
from  them  even  a  semblance  of  rhythm.  For  this  reason 
I  am  inclined  to  mistrust  all  readings  which  I  do  not  m}'"- 
self  hear.  Nevertheless,  because  these  particular  readings 
may  be  taken  as  representing  about  the  same  degree  of 
regularity  as  would  be  given  the  lines  when  read  by  the 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT        185 

ordinary  man  of  artistic  tastes,  and  because  both  they  and 
others  would  pronounce  their  readings  to  be  verse,  and 
not  prose,  I  am  compelled  to  accept  them  as  significant,. 
to  say  the  least.  I  believe  they  do  establish  the  facts,  (1) 
that  the  time-lengths  of  neither  the  syllables  nor  the  pauses, 
when  considered  separately  or  in  combination,  are  of  suffi- 
cient regularity  of  themselves  to  arouse  either  an  impres- 
sion of  periodicity  or  of  rhythm,  (2)  that,  in  spite  of  this, 
when  the  attention  is  not  occupied  specifically  with  making 
these  measurements  the  regularity  is  sufficient,  however, 
to  aid  in  the  establishment  of  a  general  feeling  of  rhythm, 
provided  there  be  furnished  concomitantly  other  phenom- 
ena of  sufficient  periodicity  of  occurrence  to  strengthen 
the  general  feeling  of  rhythm  toward  which  the  time-length 
of  syllables  and  of  pauses  is  aiding.  Even  though  the 
durations  of  two  syllables  may  differ  by  as  much  as  6/40 
of  a  second,  or  perhaps  by  even  more,  where  one  of  the  sylla- 
bles receives  a  stress  or  a  change  of  pitch  or  anything  else 
that  could  give  it  prominence,  this  additional  prominence 
is  accepted  as  an  equivalent  for  length;  and  the  two  sylla- 
bles are  considered,  if  not  exactly  equal,  certainh^  as  being 
of  the  same  kind  and  of  the  same  value. 

As  in  the  case  of  syllable-lengths,  I  have  showed  that 
for  neither  prose  nor  verse  nor  music  is  there,  strictly  speak- 
ing, equahty  of  time-length  between  accents.  It  should 
not  be  forgotten  that  in  these  arts  accent  is  never  solely  a 
question  of  greater  amplitude  of  vibration  of  the  sounding 
body,  but  should  be  thought  of  as  having  the  nature  of  the 
centroid  as  described  by  Scripture  and  Wallin.  When 
accent  is  regarded  in  this  light,  the  measurements  exhibited 
from  page  128  through  page  136  and  from  146  through  156- 
reveal  certain  salient  facts.  The  accents  of  ordinary  prose 
occur  without  regularity;  those  of  oratorical  prose  with 
more  regularity;  those  of  verse  with  still  greater  regularity; 


186     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

and  those  of  music  with  the  most  marked  regularity  of  all. 
In  verse  and  in  music  the  ear  seeks  regularity  of  accent. 
Accordingly,  the  poet  and  the  composer  do  their  best  to 
provide  the  interpreter  with  material  from  which  a  relative 
degree  of  periodicity  can  be  secured.  But  here  again,  as 
in  time-length  of  syllables,  many  factors  are  entering  to 
disturb  the  time-judgments,  not  the  least  of  which  factors 
in  verse  and  in  vocal  music  is  thought-content.  Conse- 
quently, greater  irregularity  is  found  in  them  than  in  pure 
music,  where  the  intellectual  element  is  almost  negligible. 
For  vocal  music  the  word  accent  is  made  subservient  to 
the  musical  accent;  but  in  prose  and  in  verse  word  accent 
prevails.  Racial  speech  habits  are  used  by  the  poet  to 
force  the  interpreter  of  his  verse,  in  attempting  to  bring  out 
the  meaning  of  that  verse,  to  place  the  accents  just  where 
they  will  be  needed  in  establishing  a  periodicity.  The 
presence  of  varying  numbers  of  syllables  and  varying  time- 
lengths  of  these  and  of  silences  between  the  centroids  in- 
terferes with  accurate  judgment  to  such  an  extent  that  the 
recurrence  of  the  accents  is  felt  to  be  periodic,  although  the 
accents  are  actually  separated  from  all  attendant  phenom- 
ena, and  if  the  measurements  are  made  in  units  of  from 
a  thirtieth  to  a  forty-eighth  of  a  second,  they  are  seen  to 
be  departing  from  true  periodicity  by  quite  a  wide  range. 
Of  the  phenomena  of  verse,  accent  is  the  most  prominent. 
In  both  verse  and  music  it  furnishes  for  the  ear  the  most 
convenient  standard  of  measurement.  So  strongly  does  it 
become  established  in  our  feeling  for  rhythm,  that,  where 
it  does  not  occur  in  the  usual  syllabic  succession,  it  is  for- 
cibly placed  upon  some  syllable  where  it  does  not  nor- 
mally belong,'  or  it  is  felt  as  occurring  during  a  period  of 
silence.    Rhythm   can   exist   without   accent;    but   accent 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  453. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT        187 

furnishes  so  excellent  a  means  of  making  the  rhythm  pro- 
nounced that  I  have  as  yet  been  unable  to  find  a  single 
specimen  of  English  verse  in  which  the  rhythm  is  not  made 
apparent  through  the  instrumentality  of  accent.  Rela- 
tive periodicity  of  accent  is  not  the  sole  and  controlling 
factor  in  verse  any  more  than  it  is  the  sole  factor  in  music; 
but  it  is,  nevertheless,  of  the  highest  importance  in  that  it  is 
one  of  the  means  of  marking  off  the  time-intervals  for  which 
the  sounds  and  the  silences  furnish  the  formal  content. 

Of  equal  value  with  accent  as  a  means  of  marking  time- 
units  is  the  pause.  Just  as  the  meaning  of  the  words  neces- 
sitates the  giving  of  greater  prominence  to  the  important 
syllables  than  to  the  unimportant,  so  here,  too,  in  order  to 
make  clearer  the  thought,  syllables  that  logically  belong 
together  are  grouped  in  one  breath;  and  that  grouping  is 
made  apparent  by  the  pause  which  takes  place  at  the  close 
of  each  phrase.  Phrases  increase  in  regularity  of  time- 
length  as  one  passes  from  prose  to  verse  to  music.  In 
actual  measurements  by  units  of  the  values  I  have  already 
cited,  the  phrase-lengths  of  verse  cannot  be  said  to  be  uni- 
form; yet,  when  the  comparatively  great  length  of  the 
phrase  is  taken  into  account,  and  when  the  distance  that 
one  phrase  is  sometimes  separated  from  the  phrase  to  which 
it  corresponds  is  reckoned  with,  there  is  still  less  occasion 
for  demanding  absolute  regularity  than  there  was  in  the 
cases  either  of  syllable-length  or  of  time-length  between 
accents.  The  pauses  tend  toward  periodicity  of  occurrence; 
and  for  verse  they  are  accepted  as  periodic.  Their  pres- 
ence is  another  of  the  essentials  of  verse,  although,  unless 
regularity  of  syllable  length  and  regularity  of  recurring 
accent  were  present  to  aid  in  the  measurement  of  the  inter- 
val between  the  pauses,  regularity  either  of  length  or  of 
recurrence  in  the  pauses  could  not  of  itself  differentiate 
prose  from  verse  or  verse  from  vocal  music. 


188     THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE  OF  VERSE 

Alliteration  is  a  mere  convention  that  may  add  to  the 
tonal  beauty  of  prose,  verse,  or  music.  In  Anglo-Saxon 
verse  it  was  a  decided  adjunct  to  accent;  but  in  modern 
verse  it  may  or  may  not  serve  the  latter  purpose.  Rhyme, 
on  the  contrary,  though  not  an  essential  of  verse,  when  it 
does  occur  establishes  a  periodicity  of  tone- color  exactly 
similar  to  the  periodicity  established  by  the  pause.  Rhyme 
does  not  mark  the  close  of  the  line,  as  is  erroneously  sup- 
posed, but  the  close  of  the  phrase;  for  the  line  itself  be- 
comes a  unit  only  in  so  far  as  it  is  a  phrasal  unit. 

Internal  rhyme  is  not  of  unusual  occurrence,  just  as  the 
pause  within  the  line  is  not  at  all  rare;  and,  to  my  way  of 
thinking,  the  line  in  such  instances  might  with  equal  cor- 
rectness be  broken  into  two  lines  instead  of  being  written 
as  one.  The  real  limit  to  the  length  of  the  hne,  thinks 
T.  S.  Omond,  is  our  power  of  coordination.  "Any  line 
which  cannot  be  comfortably  grasped  as  a  whole,  either 
when  heard  or  when  presented  to  the  eye,  fails  to  give  pleas- 
ure, and  is  shunned  by  the  poet  accordingly."  ^  The  perio- 
dicity of  recurrence  both  of  rhyme  and  of  line-length  is 
subject  to  just  those  corrections  which  I  have  noted  as 
necessary  to  the  understanding  of  the  nature  of  the  phrase. 
However,  rhyme  need  not  occur  at  the  close  of  every  phrase; 
and  it  may  sometimes  occur  where  the  phrase  does  not 
end,  but  where,  from  the  pattern  already  established,  the 
phrase  might  be  expected  to  end.  Similarly,  a  pause  is 
sometimes  introduced  in  such  a  way  as  to  break  up  the 
logical  phrase  group,  and  for  no  other  reason  than  that 
which  causes  the  placing  of  an  accent  upon  a  syllable  where 
normal  speech  habit  would  preclude  its  use,  —  namely, 
the  desire  to  maintain  any  periodicity  that  has  once  become 
thoroughly  established. 

1  T.  S.  Omond:  "The  Limits  of  Verse-Length,"  The  Academy,  April 
25,  1908,  pp.  711-712. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT        189 

"There  is  a  striking  difference  between  rhythmic  movement 
from  unit  group  to  unit  group  within  a  period,  and  movement 
from  period  to  period  {i.e.,  from  verse  to  verse  of  nonsense  syl- 
lables). Each  foot  is  simply  the  repetition  of  the  movement 
cycle;  all  the  tensions  are  maintained  and  each  foot  is  an  integral 
part  of  a  larger  act.  At  the  close  of  the  period  (verse)  the  active 
tensions  die  out  either  because  of  the  introduction  of  some  unusual 
stimulus  which  causes  the  positive  muscle-set  to  strike  a  heavy 
blow,  and  abruptly  upset  the  balanced  tensions,  or  because  a  pause 
of  indefinite  length  ensues  in  which  the  tensions  die  out.  This 
is  the  process  which  we  caU  'finality.' 

"In  the  stanza  there  is  evidently  a  different  type  of  unity  from 
that  in  the  single  verse.  "WTien  we  hear  the  first  verse  of  the  stanza, 
we  do  not  know  what  the  verse  whole  is,  until  the  finahty  factor 
or  the  verse  pause  is  reached,  at  its  close.  Then  the  verse  has  a 
certain  cumulative  effect,  a  synthetic  effect  which  results  from  the 
echoes  of  the  various  movements  and  the  total  effect  on  the  organ- 
ism. The  verse  pause  may  vary  within  large  Umits,  but  after  a  few 
verses  there  is  a  definite  scheme,  or  'Gestaltsquahtat,'  which 
represents  the  verse  unity.  It  is  some  sort  of  a  memory  image 
which  functions  as  a  cue  to  the  motor  process.  This  motor  image, 
set  of  strains,  or  whatever  it  may  be,  is  more  than  a  mere  standard 
by  which  we  judge  the  present  verse.  The  memory  image  fuses 
in  some  way  with  the  hving  motor  process.  The  preceding  verse 
affects  the  character  of  the  following  verse.  An  irregularity,  easily 
noted  in  the  first  verse,  is  obscured  in  the  second,  and  not  de- 
tected in  the  third  verse,  when  the  verses  are  identical." 

Whether  or  not  the  stanza  should  be  considered  as  a 
rhythmic  unit  of  verse  depends  entirely  upon  the  length 
of  the  stanza.  If  it  be  of  such  a  length  as  to  make  it  in- 
capable of  being  held  in  consciousness  as  a  unit,  I  should 
say  most  positively  that  it  is  not  a  rhythmic  unit,  no  mat- 
ter how  closely  it  may  be  knit  logically.  Every  rhythmic 
unit  must  be  immediately  perceived  as  a  whole,  the  first 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  459. 


190     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

of  which  has  not  passed  out  of  consciousness  before  the 
end  is  reached.  Again  the  personal  equation  comes  into 
play.  Where  one  subject  can  keep  before  himself  two, 
three,  or  four  phrases,  another  can  easily  retain  in  con- 
sciousness eight  or  ten.  I  should  say,  therefore,  that  the 
longer  stanzaic  forms  and  stanzas  that  run  on  are  not  rhyth- 
mic units  at  all,  but  merely  convenient  methods  of  writ- 
ing phrasal  groups  so  as  to  make  their  rhyme  scheme  readily 
apparent  to  the  eye.  For  me  personally  the  Italian  sonnet 
and  the  Spenserian  stanza  do  not  form  rhythmic  units, 
because  they  fall  apart  long  before  I  have  come  to  the  end, 
and  I  am  compelled  either  to  count  on  my  fingers  or  to  go 
back  after  having  read  them  and  make  an  analysis  of  their 
structure  before  I  am  able  to  say  exactly  what  I  have  heard. 
In  just  this  way  long  prose  sentences  fall  apart  before  the 
close  is  reached;  and  only  fragments,  —  a  phrase,  a  clause, 
or  a  member  —  can  be  retained  in  consciousness  at  any 
one  time  as  an  immediate  perception. 

In  a  study  of  sentence-lengths  with  a  view  to  deriving 
therefrom  any  additional  knowledge  as  to  the  nature  of 
prose  rhythm,  I  can  see  nothing  to  be  gained.^  Such  perio- 
dicity as  occurs  comes  only  at  the  close  of  intervals  of  time 
too  large  to  be  detected  except  by  very  careful  counting 

1  The  work  done  by  the  following  men  at  the  University  of  Nebraska, 
Lincoln,  Nebraska,  was  of  this  nature :  — 

L.  A.  Sherman:  "Some  Observations  upon  the  Sentence-Length  in 
English  Prose,"  University  Studies,  Vol.  I.,  No.  2,  October,  1888,  p.  119; 
and  "On  Certain  Facts  and  Principles  in  the  Development  of  Form  in 
Literature,"  Ibid.,  Vol.  I.,  No.  4,  July,  1892,  p.  337. 

G.  W.  Gerwig:  "On  the  Decrease  of  Predication  and  of  Sentence 
Weight  in  English  Prose,"  University  Studies,  Vol.  IL,  No.  1,  July, 
1894,  p.  17. 

R.  E.  Moritz:  "On  the  Variation  and  Functional  Relation  of  Certain 
Sentence  Constants  in  Standard  Literature,"  University  Studies,  Vol. 
IIL,  No.  3,  July,  1903,  p.  229. 


THE  STRUCTURE  OF  THE  FOOT        191 

plus  additional  computations.  Rhythm  is  concerned  with 
the  apparent,  the  immediately  perceived.  The  facts  that 
have  been  brought  out  by  the  studies  of  prose  style  con- 
ducted at  the  University  of  Nebraska  are  interesting  in 
many  ways;  but  they  add  nothing  to  our  knowledge  of 
rhythm  as  characteristic  of  prose,  verse,  or  music.  For 
exactly  the  same  reason  the  larger  divisions  of  musical 
compositions  cannot  be  considered  rhythmic  units.  The 
several  movements  of  a  sonata  or  of  a  symphony  are  logic- 
ally complete.  Each  is  sufficient  unto  itself;  but  each  is 
too  long  to  be  compassed  by  a  single  span  of  consciousness. 
The  tonal  arts,  then,  are  built  up  by  the  combination 
of  silences  with  sounds  of  different  tone-color,  capable  of 
being  given  desired  time-lengths  and  degrees  of  intensity 
and  of  being  employed  at  various  pitches  more  or  less  stand- 
ardized. For  English  prose  and  verse  and  for  music  the 
phenomena  which  make  possible  the  measurement  of  rhythm 
are  two,  —  the  centroid  and  the  pause.  Neither  one  occurs 
with  unfailing  regularity;  but  both  can  be  made  to  ap- 
proach periodicity  sufficiently  to  be  accepted  as  periodic 
when  attention  is  not  centered  solely  upon  the  measure- 
ment of  time-intervals.  Prose  makes  no  effort  to  secure 
from  these  periodicity  of  any  kind.  Still,  certain  types  of 
emotional  prose  unconsciously  fall  into  more  or  less  pro- 
nounced periodic  recurrence  of  centroids  and  of  pauses. 
In  verse  and  in  music  this  periodicity  is  deliberately  sought; 
and,  when  it  is  not  attained  to  a  degree  which  is  accepted 
bj'^  the  ear  as  exact,  the  pronouncement  of  judgment  is 
both  speedy  and  condemnatory.  The  periodicity  of  music 
is  more  nearly  accurate,  however,  than  that  of  verse, 
because  in  verse  other  considerations  must  give  place  to 
thought,  while  in  music  thought  is  sacrificed  to  regularity 
of  form.  Both  verse  and  music  have  as  their  primary 
object  the  awakening  of  the  emotions.     Verse  is  compelled 


192  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

to  secure  this  awakening  through  an  appeal  to  the  intellect 
as  well  as  to  the  senses.  Pure  music  makes  its  appeal 
primarily  to  the  senses.  Therefore,  when  undistracted  by 
the  thought-content  of  the  sounds,  the  ear  is  much  stricter 
in  enforcing  its  demands,  though  at  no  time  is  it  overbear- 
ingly tyrannical.  To  say  that  the  degree  of  periodicity 
attained  by  the  recurring  centroids  and  pauses  is  the  dis- 
tinguishing factor  in  the  differentiation  of  prose  from  verse 
and  of  both  from  music  would  be  to  fall  very  far  short  of 
the  truth.  This  degree  of  periodicity  is  a  factor,  and  un- 
deniably an  indispensable  factor;  but,  after  all,  it  is  only 
one  factor.  These  two  types  of  periodicity  ought  theoret- 
ically to  be  sufficient  to  establish  rhythm.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  the  rhj^thm  of  art  is  never  felt  to  be  rhythm  unless 
a  third  factor  is  present  along  with  these.  There  must 
be  not  only  the  consecutive  occurrence  of  phenomena. 
To  this  must  be  added  the  perception  of  a  succession  of 
distinct,  related  patterns  in  time. 


CHAPTER  XV 
THE    CONTENT    OF    THE    PHRASE 

Between  pauses  come  sounds  which  are  either  centroid 
or  non-centroid,  and  which  are  capable  of  being  given 
desired  durations  and  of  being  arranged  in  desired  suc- 
cessions. A  group  of  sounds  between  two  pauses  I  have 
already  defined  as  the  phrase.  I  have  shown,  too,  that  the 
pauses  of  verse  and  of  vocal  music  occur  with  a  fair  degree 
of  periodicity.  Since  this  is  the  case,  the  length  of  each 
phrase  must  be  sensibly  equal  to  some  other  phrase.  It 
is  the  formal  content  of  the  phrase  which  I  now  wish  to 
examine.  This  must  be  made  up  of  centroid  and  non- 
centroid  sounds.  We  know  that  the  centroid  sounds  occur 
at  time-intervals  which  are  felt,  when  not  too  closely  in- 
spected, to  be  of  equal  length.  The  question,  therefore, 
arises:  What  relation  is  borne  by  the  centroid  to  the  non- 
centroid  sounds? 

Music  is  built  upon  the  assumption  that  the  time  between 
centroids  is  occupied  by  sounds  bearing  to  one  another 
such  ratios  as  are  expressed  by  the  series  1 :  2: 4:  8: 16:  32:  64, 
and  that  the  number  of  these  units  between  successive  cen- 
troids is  equal.  When  the  sounds  are  actually  played  or 
sung,  however,  the  theory  does  not  hold  with  any  degree 
of  strictness;  yet  the  successions  are  sufficiently  regular 
for  them  to  be  felt  as  presenting  patterns  which  are  related 
both  in  absolute  time-value  and  in  the  order  of  the  arrange- 
ment of  the  sounds  within  the  groups.  Where  the  time- 
values  of  the  sounds  are  as  definitely  fixed  as  in  music, 

193 


194     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

there  is  less  necessity  for  definiteness  of  arrangement  as 
to  the  types  of  succession  which  shall  occur  within  the 
time-intervals  between  centroids.  Nevertheless,  there  is  a 
constant  tendency  for  the  same  type  of  arrangement  to 
repeat  itself,  so  much  so,  indeed,  that  music  is  usually  felt 
as  rhythmic  group  after  rhythmic  group.  Where  the  pat- 
terns themselves  are  different,  the  whole  is  held  together 
by  the  regularity  of  the  recurring  centroid  and  by  the 
common  relation  borne  to  each  other  by  the  sounds  within 
the  successive  centroid  units.  In  music  any  number  of 
rhythms  may  be  carried  forward  simultaneously.  In  fact, 
according  to  Stetson, 

"The  essential  character  of  musical  rhythm,  as  contrasted 
with  the  rhythm  of  both  simple  sounds  and  of  verse,  is  just  this 
coordination  of  a  number  of  rhythms  which  move  side  by  side. 
This  is  the  reason  for  the  immense  complexity  and  variety  of  musi- 
cal rhythms.  The  processes  check  each  other  and  furnish  a  basis 
for  a  precision  and  elaborateness  of  rhythmical  movement  in  the 
individual  parts  which  is  quite  impossible  in  a  simple  rhythm."  ^ 

Although  at  least  two  theories  of  verse  have  posited  mathe- 
matical exactness  in  the  relation  of  the  syllables  within  the 
centroid  groups  as  fundamental,  such  a  precision  of  time- 
lengths  between  centroids  or  of  the  syllables  within  the 
intervals  marked  off  by  the  recurrence  of  centroids  is  even 
less  defensible  than  in  music.  However,  when  due  allow- 
ance has  been  made  for  the  inaccuracies  of  time-judg- 
ments, the  time-lengths  of  the  syllables  do  approach  the 
time-lengths  of  notes,  not  as  written  but  as  played.  Not- 
withstanding, of  itself  this  approximation  would  not  be 
sufficiently  close  to  bind  together  either  the  centroid  groups 
or  the  phrases  if  something  further  were  not  added.  Here 
order  of  arrangement  comes  in  to  help  establish  a  further 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  465. 


THE  CONTENT  OF  THE  PHRASE  195 

feeling  of  relationship.  Even  though  there  may  be  no 
mathematical  precision  in  the  ratios  of  the  syllables,  some 
syllables  are  felt  to  be  longer  than  others,  and  some  are 
felt  to  be  centroid  and  others  non-centroid.  By  arranging 
successions  of  both  longer  and  shorter  and  of  both  centroid 
and  non-centroid  syllables  rhythmical  patterns  are  formed. 
These  successions  of  types  when  marked  off  by  centroids 
give  rise  to  a  feeling  of  definite  time-relationship  among  the 
syllables,  which,  even  once  established,  makes  possible  the 
replacing  of  any  syllable  or  syllables  of  the  pattern  by  other 
syllables  which  are  felt  to  have  approximately  the  same 
time-value  as  the  syllable  or  syllables  replaced.^  As  soon  as 
any  one  type  of  arrangement  ceases  to  prevail,  the  rhythm 
falls  apart,  because  the  time  values  of  the  syllables  are 
not  sufficiently  exact  to  furnish  the  ear  with  a  distinct 
pattern  of  tone.  Each  phrase,  however,  presents  a  par- 
ticular rhythmic  pattern  which  may  or  may  not  ever  be 
exactly  duplicated  in  the  course  of  the  poem;  but,  because 
the  phrases  are  constructed  upon  a  framework  of  a  common 
periodicity,  made  evident  by  the  recurring  centroid  syllable, 
and  because  a  fairly  uniform  time-relationship,  indispen- 
sably strengthened  by  a  similarity  of  kind  in  the  order  of 
arrangement  of  the  syllables,  is  maintained  throughout 
by  the  syllables  and  the  pauses,  a  feeling  of  artistic  com- 
pleteness and  unity  is  realizable.  One  phrase  of  a  poem 
can  never  be  understood  when  considered  alone.  It  is  a 
part  of  a  continuum.  It  fits  in  with  all  that  has  preceded 
and  with  all  that  is  to  follow;  and  it  must  be  felt  as  vitally 
related  to  the  whole.  To  conceive  of  each  centroid  group 
within  the  phrase  as  an  independent  unit,  and  of  each 
phrase  as  a  larger  independent  unit,  is  to  commit  the  gravest 
of  errors.     Though  the  syllabic  pattern  may  be  this  at  one 

^  Warner  Brown,  "Time  in  English  Verse  Rhythm"  (p.  75),  agrees 
with  this  conception. 


196     THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

moment  and  that  at  the  next,  all  rests  upon  a  common 
basis  of  measured  time. 

Coleridge  thought  the  distinguishing  quality  of  verse 
to  consist  in  the  number  of  accents  in  the  line.  His  con- 
fusion was  doubtless  the  result  of  his  failure  to  recognize 
that,  although  the  line  is  usually  coincident  with  the  phrase, 
and  although  within  a  given  poem  the  phrases  normally 
contain  the  same  number  of  centroid  syllables,  neverthe- 
less, it  is  the  tendency  of  corresponding  phrases  toward 
equality  of  time-length  that  makes  possible  their  division 
by  an  approximately  equal  number  of  centroid  syllables. 

What  difference  does  it  make  whether  the  phrase  begins 
with  a  centroid  or  a  non-centroid  syllable,  or  whether  it 
ends  with  a  centroid  or  non-centroid  syllable?  What  dif- 
ference does  it  make  whether  it  contains  this  number  of 
syllables  or  that,  or  in  what  order  the  several  types  of  sylla- 
bles are  arranged?  The  whole  truth,  as  I  see  it,  is  to  be 
found  in  the  possibility  of  placing  these  numerous  rhythmic 
groups  together  in  such  a  manner  as  to  form  an  organic 
whole:  and  this  is  possible  only  because  they  are  all  so 
constructed  as  to  work  into  a  general  time  scheme,  meas- 
ured by  the  periodic  recurrence  of  centroids  and  made  the 
more  apparent  by  the  fairl}'-  regular  recurrence  of  the  same 
type  of  syllabic  succession.  "The  continuity  of  the  rhyth- 
mic series,"  says  Stetson,^  "whereby  all  the  beats  of  a 
period  seem  to  belong  to  a  single  whole  is  due  to  the  con- 
tinuity of  muscular  sensations  involved  and  the  continuous 
feeling  of  slight  tension  l^etween  the  positive  and  negative 
muscle  sets.  Nowhere  within  the  period  does  the  feeling 
of  strain  die  out."  If  the  phrase  succession  happens  to 
begin  with  a  centroid  syllable,  it  is  quite  probable  that  the 
syllables  will  be  felt  to  succeed  each  other  as  centroid  fol- 
lowed by  non-centroid  throughout  the  length  of  the  phrase, 

1  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  445,  III. 


THE  CONTENT  OF  THE  PHRASE  197 

while  the  very  next  phrase,  if  begun  with  a  non-centroid 
syllable,  will  probably  be  felt  to  have  the  rhythmic  group- 
ing non-centroid  followed  by  centroid.  The  centroids 
themselves  have  not  shifted  their  positions.  The  differ- 
ence lies  in  the  way  in  which  the  other  syllable  or  syllables 
are  felt  to  be  grouped  in  regard  to  the  centroids.  Even 
though  subjective  factors  may  be  the  most  potent  in  deter- 
mining whether  a  syllable  or  syllables  shall  be  felt  as 
grouped  with  the  preceding  or  with  the  following  centroid, 
many  objective  factors  do  come  into  play;  and  the  feeling  of 
rhythm  is  the  more  definitely  established  as  we  proceed  in  a 
phrase,  or  a  series  of  simple  sound  sensations.  Until  the  cycle 
is  perfectly  adjusted,  complete  automatism  cannot  be  possible.^ 

When  sounds  are  robbed  of  their  intellectual  significance 
and  are  mechanically  altered  to  suit  the  experimenter,  it  is 
perfectly  possible  to  say  what  order  of  grouping  the  hearer 
will  normally  make;  but,  when,  as  in  verse,  no  such  sim- 
plicity of  experimentation  is  possible,  and  when,  in  a  great 
degree,  thought-content  is  influencing  both  the  length  of 
time  accorded  each  syllable  and  the  amount  of  stress  which 
each  syllable  is  receiving,  the  matter  becomes  much  less 
capable  of  predetermination,  or  even  of  determination  at  all. 
Many  and  unprofitable  have  been  the  hours  I  have  spent 
in  trying  to  determine  with  a  number  of  friends  whether  a 
certain  succession  of  syllables  presented  a  series  of  trochees 
or  of  iambuses,  of  dactyls  or  anapaests.  As  one  read  them, 
they  were  of  a  certain  type;  as  another  read  them,  the 
type  was  reversed.  Of  course,  where  the  types  are  perfectly 
regular,  no  occasion  for  difference  of  opinion  arises.  But, 
alas!  the  most  beautiful  verse  is  rarely  regular  in  type. 

The  unity  is  that  of  a  single  coordinated  movement. 
This  is  nowhere  more  apparent  than  in  nonsense  syllables. 
But  for  the  regularity  of  recurring  centroids  and  for  the 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:   "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  445. 


198     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

general  form,  the  different  phrases  would  be  no  better  than 
a  jumble.^  It  is  in  nonsense  verse,  as  might  be  expected, 
that  the  rhythm  of  verse  approaches  the  rhythm  of  music 
most  closely.  For  it  is  here  that  thought-content  is  at  the 
minimum. 

Exactly  the  same  state  of  affairs  in  regard  to  rhythmic 
grouping  prevails  in  music  as  in  verse.  One  conductor  will 
have  his  orchestra  play  a  composition  in  such  a  manner  as 
to  bring  out  a  rhythmic  pattern  in  a  particular  way  and 
another  conductor  will  reverse  the  successions.  Some- 
times it  is  next  to  impossible  to  discover  any  rhythmic 
pattern  at  all,  because  melodic  and  harmonic  factors  are 
outweighing  rhythmic  considerations.  In  verse,  however, 
this  latter  state  of  affairs  ought  never  to  arise.  Verse  has 
no  fixed  tonal  framework.  Therefore,  unless  the  rhythm 
is  well  marked,  the  poem  falls  apart  structurally. 

The  primary  requisite  of  the  unit  groups  is  that  they 
shall  be  alike,  not  equal.  "Time  is  not  mysteriously  lost; 
the  objective  difference  is  not  noticed,  simply  because  there 
are  no  striking  differences  in  the  cycles  to  lead  one  to  a  time 
judgment."  ^ 

Scansion  is  nothing  more  than  an  attempt  to  present  to 
the  eye  the  rhythmic  pattern  of  the  poem.  The  only  prob- 
lem for  the  scanner  ought  to  be  :  What  is  the  best  way  of 
writing  down  the  rhythm  as  it  is  heard?  For,  what  the 
rhythm  is  heard  as  being,  not  what  the  rhythm  presents 
to  the  eye  when  written  down,  is  the  matter  of  consequence. 
Counting  on  the  fingers  may  aid  in  the  writing  out  of  a 
rhythm;  but  my  experience  has  always  been  that  the  man 
who  has  to  count  on  his  fingers  in  order  to  follow  the  rhyth- 
mic structure  of  a  poem  is  pretty  sure  to  have  but  a  mediocre 
susceptibility  to  rhythm  in  general. 

1  R.  H.  Stetson:  "Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  p.  443.        ^  lUd.,  p.  461. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE    RHYTHM    OF    PROSE 

What  of  the  rhythm  of  prose?  Having  seen  what  con- 
stitutes rhythm  in  general  and  the  rhythm  of  verse  in  par- 
ticular, it  should  now  be  easier  to  understand  the  rhythm 
of  prose.  Exactly  the  same  phenomena  are  presented  as 
the  material  from  which  to  construct  prose  as  that  pre- 
sented for  the  construction  of  verse.  The  difference  be- 
tween prose  and  verse  rests  in  the  peculiar  uses  to  which 
each  form  subjects  this  material.  Grammatically  and 
rhetorically  but  few  distinctions  can  be  drawn  between 
verse  and  prose;  and  these  are  neither  germain  nor  signif- 
icant. What  lines  of  demarcation  can  be  set  up  must 
rest  upon  the  difference  in  intention  of  the  two  forms. 
Verse  sets  out  to  secure  regularity,  to  bind  poet  and  hearer 
in  a  common  emotional  experience  by  an  appeal  to  the 
almost  universal  susceptibility  of  men  to  the  influence  of 
measured  time.  Prose  has  no  such  intention.  It  does 
not  set  out  to  secure  regularity.  What  regularity  it  at- 
tains comes  as  the  result  of  human  inability  to  escape  from 
a  certain  degree  of  periodicity  in  all  thought  and  in  alt 
action.  As  emotion  increases,  the  tendency  toward  regu- 
larity of  expression  increases,  until  at  a  given  moment  of 
emotional  excitement  all  regularity  breaks  down,  and  ex- 
pression of  any  kind  becomes  impossible.  Both  thought, 
and  expression  are  for  the  moment  paralyzed.  As  I  have 
said  before,  the  point  at  which  prose  passes  into  verse 
is  impossible  of  determination.     Therefore,  the  best  that 

199 


200     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

can  be  done  is  to  examine  the  most  highly  artistic  prose 
that  is  clearly  prose  and  not  verse,  and  therefrom  try  to 
formulate  the  difference  between  the  two. 

Undoubtedly  the  centroids  of  prose  are  equally  as  pro- 
nounced as  the  centroids  of  verse;  and  in  many  instances 
the  recurrence  of  the  centroids  of  prose  is  not  much  less 
regular  than  that  of  verse.  The  phrase-lengths  of  prose 
approach  in  regularity  the  phrase-lengths  of  verse.  By 
actual  measurements,  the  syllable-lengths  of  prose  are  not 
more  irregular  than  the  syllable-lengths  of  some  verse.  In 
examining  the  arrangement  of  syllables  within  the  divisions 
from  centroid  to  centroid  almost  any  pattern  that  is  found 
in  verse  can  also  be  found  in  prose.  But  at  this  point  the 
analogy  ceases.  The  intention  of  the  two  being  opposed, 
the  means  of  securing  their  several  ends  must  be  different. 

I  have  pointed  out  for  verse  that  the  unifying  principle 
is  found  not  only  in  felt  time-relationship  between  any  one 
unit  and  any  other,  but  also  among  all  the  parts,  so  that 
they  can  become  factors  in  the  creation  of  an  impression  of 
totality  and  completeness,  and  that  this  feeling  is  due  par- 
ticularly to  the  repetition  of  types  of  syllabic  arrangement. 
The  prevalence  of  any  one  type  is  never  sufficiently 
marked  in  prose  to  arouse  a  feeling  of  time-relationship 
in  either  the  speaker  or  the  hearer.  One  phrase,  for  in- 
stance, may  present  a  certain  type;  but  the  very  next 
phrase  will  present  another  type  of  such  entirely  different 
structure  that  the  feeling  of  relationship  is  prevented  from 
establishing  itself.  In  prose  the  units  are  mosaic  in  struc- 
ture. They  are  merely  placed  next  to  each  other  without 
regard  to  a  unifying  principle,  without  the  slightest  inten- 
tion of  creating  the  impression  of  temporal  relationship. 
There  is  no  striving  for  periodicity  of  recurring  centroids  or 
of  periodicity  of  recurring  pauses  in  order  that  both  may 
aid   in   marking  for  the  ear  the  arrangement   of  syllabic 


THE  RHYTHM  OF  PROSE  201 

types  in  such  succession  as  will  arouse  a  feeling  of  temporal 
uniformity  throughout  the  whole.  The  rhythmic  units  of 
prose  are  fragmentary,  undeveloped,  unrelated.  To  study 
the  rhythm  of  prose  is  as  unproductive  of  results  as  to  study 
the  tunes  of  speech.  Both  are  ever  varying,  formless,  and, 
therefore,  incapable  of  analysis. 

Many  attempts  have  been  made  to  establish  for  prose 
a  rhythmic  structure  exactly  analogous  to  that  of  verse. ^ 
The  analysis  of  prose  would  never  have  been  undertaken, 
however,  if  there  had  been  in  the  minds  of  the  analysts 
anything  approaching  a  true  conception  of  the  nature  of 
rhythm  in  general  or  of  verse  rhythm  in  particular.  All 
that  Professor  Saintsbury,  for  instance,  has  succeeded  in 
showing  is  the  utter  futihty  and  the  utter  fruitlessness  of 
the  task  which  he  set  himself.  I  do  not  see  how  any  one 
can  read  "A  History  of  Prose  Rhythm"  without  gaining  a 
higher  appreciation  of  such  beauties  as  prose  undoubtedly 
possesses  and  a  clearer  knowledge  of  the  stylistic  changes 
which  have  gradually  taken  place  through  a  great  number 
of  years.  I  closed  the  book  with  regret;  but  it  was  with 
regret  that  as  great  a  mind  as  Professor  Saintsbury's  could 
hold  so  inadequate  a  conception  of  the  nature  of  rhythm 
as  he  here  displays,  rather  than  regret  that  a  useless  search 
was  ended;   for  Professor  Saintsbury  certainly  has  the  rare 

1  George  Saintsbury:  "History  of  Prose  Rhythm"  (Macmillan, 
1912). 

Albert  C.  Clark:   "Prose  Rhythm  in  EngUsh"  (Clarendon  Press). 

K.  Marbe:  "tjber  d.  Rhythmus  d.  Prosa,"  Giessen,  1904  (Oxford, 
1913). 

Abram  Lipsky:  "Rhythm  as  a  Distinguishing  Characteristic  of 
Prose  Style  "  (Science  Press,  New  York,  1907). 

Fred  Newton  Scott:  "The  Scansion  of  Prose  Rhythm,"  Modern 
Lang.  Notes,  Dec,  1905;  and  "The  Most  Fundamental  Differentia  of 
Poetry  and  Prose,"  Modern  Lang.  Notes,  June,  1904. 

D.  Winter:   "Verse  and  Prose." 


202     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

faculty  of  entertaining  most  delightfully  even  where  he 
fails  to  convince. 

To  the  work  of  such  men  as  those  to  whom  I  have  been 
referring  in  the  preceding  paragraph,  that  of  William  Mor- 
rison Patterson  ^  is  a  most  notable  exception.  His  book 
did  not  come  to  hand  until  my  own  investigations  had 
been  closed  and  my  manuscript  was  ready  for  press.  It  is, 
therefore,  with  peculiar  pleasure  that  I  find  myself  in  al- 
most entire  agreement  with  his  general  attitude,  especially 
as  we  drew  in  large  measure  from  a  common  fund  of  psy- 
chological data.  To  this  Dr.  Patterson  has  added  further 
experiments  of  his  own,  which,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  seem  to 
me  inconclusive  in  at  least  two  particulars.  How  easy  it 
might  have  been  for  him  to  test  a  far  greater  number  of 
prose  specimens!  how  easy  to  extend  the  length  of  those 
which  he  did  test!  (The  longest  contains  only  sixty-three 
words.)  Beyond  a  doubt  short  passages  of  selected  prose 
meet  in  every  particular  the  same  rhythmic  requirements 
as  are  met  by  verse.  My  contention,  however,  is  this: 
The  vast  body  of  prose  is  inappreciably  rhythmical;  and 
even  the  most  rhythmical  prose  must  after  a  few  sentences 
either  suffer  a  most  disagreeable  interruption  of  the  forward 
swing  to  which  it  may  return  at  intervals,  or  lose  this  swing 
altogether  in  a  constantly  changing  movement.  There 
is  in  it  no  such  continuity  of  progress  as  characterizes  verse. 
Otherwise  how  is  prose  to  be  distinguished  from  vers  libre 
or  verse  from  either? 

To  this  Dr.  Patterson  would  reply  that  the  rhythmic 
unit  is  more  elastic  than  I  am  willing  to  admit.  Let  me 
quote  him  at  length: 

"The  truth  of  the  matter  is  that  the  liberties  allowed  by  the 
introduction  of   an  elastic  unit,   and   the  endless  possibilities  of 

1  "The  Rhythm  of  Prose  "  (Columbia  University  Press,  1916). 


THE  RHYTHM  OF  PROSE  203 

syncopation  ^  and  substitution,  render  quite  easy  to  a  musical 
observer  the  task  of  fitting  a  series  of  unitary  impulses  to  any 
series  of  irregular  sounds  (provided  the  sounds  do  not  come  too 
close  together  to  be  discriminated  or  so  far  apart  that  they  cannot 
easily  be  grasped  as  the  boundaries  of  a  continuous  interval). 
Whatever  is  not  explained  by  syncopation  and  substitution  is 
easily  explained  by  acceleration  and  retarding.  We  must  add  to 
all  this  the  process  of  so-called  'subjective  grouping,'  both  volun- 
tary and  involuntary,  by  means  of  which  our  perception  of 
objective  conditions,  up  to  a  certain  degree,  comes  under  the  dis- 
torting influence  of  'impressions.'  Such  illusions  are  fed  by  our 
enjoyment  of  the  variegated  effects  of  subjective  organization. 
What  needs  to  be  remembered,  then,  is  that  for  the  individual, 
and  consequently  for  psychology,  these  illusions  are  in  themselves 
important  '  facts'  of  conscious  life. 

"It  is  thus  that  we  become  aware  of  the  phenomena  heralded 
by  Wundt's  general  statement  about  the  possible  rhythmic  con- 
ception of  all  series  of  sounds,  and  exempUfied  in  the  data  listed 
in  Appendix  III.  There  are  individuals  for  whom  a  series  of 
apparently  irregular  sounds  can  be  easily  organized  subjectively 
into  a  satisfying  rhythmic  tune.  There  are  also  individuals  for 
whom  the  task  is  difficult,  if  not  impossible.    Prose  thus  becomes 

1  Syncopation  is  "the  act,  process,  or  result  of  inverting  the  rhythmic 
accent  by  beginning  a  tone  or  tones  on  an  unaccented  beat  or  pulse, 
and  sustaining  them  into  an  accented  one,  so  that  the  proper  emphasis 
on  the  latter  is  more  or  less  transferred  back  or  anticipated."  —  "The 
Century  Dictionary  Cyclopedia."  "Sound  rhythm,  of  course,  deals 
with  sounds  and  silences;  but  concomitant  with  purely  sound  rhythm 
is  motor  rhythm,  thought  rhythm,  etc.  Concomitant  sets  of  time- 
intervals,  accordingly,  when  not  coinciding,  institute  one  form  of 
syncopation.  Another  form  occurs  when  there  is  interchange  in  the 
nature  of  the  sensations  or  movements  which  mark  off  time-intervals. 
Finger-taps  alternating  with  spoken  syllables  are  an  illustration."  — 
"The  Rhythm  of  Prose,"  p.  92.  Syncopation  must  not  be  confused 
with  syncope,  a  term  employed  by  Sievers  in  "  Rhythmische-melodische 
Studien"  (Heidelberg,  1912,  p.  10),  to  mean  the  omission  of  an  un- 
accented syllable  in  a  foot,  on  account  of  which  omission  an  accented 
syllable  does  duty  for  two. 


204     THE   FOUNDATIONS  AND   NATURE   OF   VERSE 

for  some  observers  a  sort  of  music,  built  upon  elastic  unitary 
pulses,  sometimes  grouped  and  always  syncopating  freely;  but 
for  others,  it  remains,  and  must  always  remain,  an  utter  mystery, 
regarded  either  with  indifference,  or  as  tantaUzing  because  of  its 
constant  suggestion  of  a  rhythm  never  fully  achieved  except  in 
spots  —  a  so-called  'free'  amorphous  entity,  identified  merely 
by  the  chiUing  assurance  that,  at  any  rate,  it  is  not  verse. 

"A  new  standard  is  thus  estabUshed  for  passing  judgment  upon 
the  rhythm  of  a  sentence  or  paragraph.  The  marking  of  gram- 
matical (dictionary)  accent  is  by  itself  misleading,  except  for  the 
purpose  of  detecting  passages  of  metrical  patchwork  such  as  occur 
in  the  writings  of  IngersoU,  or  unusually  long  stretches  of  'iambics' 
such  as  have  been  fished  out  of  Dickens  and  Ruskin.  The  reason 
such  'scanning'  is  misleading,  is  simply  that  a  slow  reading  of  some 
of  our  most  unimpeachable  prose  turns  it  into  just  such  iambic 
or  trochaic  drivel,  while  a  rapid  reading  of  some  of  the  ridiculed 
passages  introduces  a  varied  swing  that  competes  (in  ease,  spon- 
taneity and  appropriateness)  with  the  very  best.  The  stress- 
patterns  of  routine  scanning  have  thus  Uttle  more  than  suggestive 
value,  when  considered  apart  from  the  molding  influences  of  tone- 
oolor  and  dominating  mood  of  thought.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
stress-patterns  of  actual  experience  have  great  significance,  and 
when  combined  with  the  corresponding  time,  pitch,  quality  and 
thought  patterns,  complete  what  we  mean  by  the  rhythm  of 
language."  ^ 

"From  this  point  of  view,  typical  prose  is  uttered  language 
which,  on  a  given  occasion,  produces  a  series  of  syllabic  impres- 
sions, whose  temporal  arrangement  is  largely  irregular,  that  is, 
haphazard,  but  which  can  be  subjectively  organized  by  an  aggres- 
sive timer.  A  spontaneous  or  automatic  process  of  syncopation 
between  the  syllabic  sounds  and  the  subjective  unitary  pulses 
secures  satisfactory  coordination,  in  the  same  way  that  a  negro 
automatically  improvises  comphcated  syncopating  melodies  while 
he  phes  his  hoe  in  the  corn-field."  ^ 

"Taking  well-defined  prose  experience  to  be  due  to  a  predom- 
inance of  syncopation   in  the  relation   between  a  timer's  elastic 

1  "  The  Rhythm  of  Prose,"  p.  12.  »  Ibid,  p.  74. 


THE  RHYTHM  OF  PROSE  205 

measuring  pulses  and  the  syllables  in  which  we  feel  impressions 
of  accent,  and  regarding  verse  experience  as  due  to  a  predominance 
of  coincidence  in  this  relation,  we  first  of  all  conceive  the  rhythm  of 
either  prose  or  verse  in  the  form  of  a  rhythmic  tune,  combining 
patterns  of  time,  stress,  and,  to  some  extent,  pitch.  Patterns  of 
tone-color  are  superimposed,  as  soon  as  we  consider  the  actual 
sounds  of  the  words,  and  patterns  of  subjective  weight,  as  soon  as 
we  consider  the  words  as  vehicles  of  thought  and  feeling,  in  addition 
to  their  auditory  impression."  ^ 

"There  are  only  two  ways  in  which  a  series  of  measuring  time- 
units  can  be  coordinated  with  a  second  series  of  sensations  — 
syncopation  and  coincidence.  Either  syncopation  predominates, 
in  which  instance  we  feel  the  stimulus  as  prose,  or  coincidence 
predominates,  and  verse  experience  ensues.  What  room  is  there 
for  a  tertium  quidf  Nothing  remains  but  the  purely  hypothetical 
case  where  syncopation  and  coincidence  are  exactly  balanced  in 
their  occurrence,  or  else  a  mere  confusion  of  mind  in  which  tem- 
poral coordination  practically  ceases,  that  is,  in  which  rhythm,  so 
far  as  the  timer  is  concerned,  has  been  abrogated.  .  .  .  Accord- 
ingly, there  exists  no  fundamental  time-rhythm  experience  corres- 
ponding  to  a  tertium  quid  between  prose  and  regular  verse.  What 
actually  happens  in  the  hearing  or  utterance  either  of  vers  libre  or 
of  certain  forms  of  so-called  'rhythmic  prose'  is  that  during  one 
phrase  or  group  of  phrases  the  aggressive  timer  feels  syncopating 
temporal  experiences,  during  the  next  phrase  or  group  he  begins 
to  feel  coincidence  of  the  accents  with  his  subjective  measuring 
pulses.  The  more  vague  impressions  of  the  stresser  are  significant 
in  the  study  of  individual  difference,  but  hardly  illuminating  with 
regard  to  the  distinctive  experience  of  rhythm  because  of  his 
overly  blurred  sense  of  time-values. 

"According  to  the  results  of  our  experiments,  therefore,  there 
is  no  psychological  meaning  to  the  claims  for  a  third  genre  between 
regular  prose  and  verse,  except  in  the  sense  of  a  jumping  back 
and  forth  from  one  side  of  the  fence  to  the  other.  In  spite  of  the 
fact,  then,  that  many  passages  can  be  felt  as  either  prose  or  verse, 
according  to  the  utterance  or  the  amount  of  'suggestion'  received 
1  Ibid,  p.  75. 


206  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

through  visual  arrangement,  grammatical  (dictionary)  accent, 
artifices  of  tone-color,  figures  of  speech,  elevated  diction,  etc., 
nothing  more  than  an  unstable  compound  can  be  created  out  of 
the  two  typical  forms  of  temporal  experience."  ^ 

"It  must  be  recognized  that  whenever  so-called  vers  lihre  goes 
beyond  mere  irregularity  of  length  of  fine,  and  alternates  suc- 
cessions of  repeated  stress-patterns  with  stretches  where  the  gram- 
matical accent  is  sufficiently  irregular  to  suggest  syncopating 
rhythmic  responses,  there  results  for  the  timer  a  patch  work  prod- 
uct, involving  two  processes  which  psychologically  do  not  fuse."  * 

Just  here,  it  seems  to  me,  lies  the  one  weak  point  in  Dr. 
Patterson's  position.  If  prose  is  syncopated  rhythm  and 
verse  coincident  rhythm,  then  the  two  ought  to  fuse;  and 
it  ought  to  be  possible  to  pass  from  one  to  the  other  without 
a  feeling  of  break,  just  as  is  constantly  happening  in  the 
developed  themes  of  many  of  Beethoven's  sonatas  and  in 
rag-time.  Vers  lihre  is,  in  the  main,  an  amorphous  prose, 
standing  at  the  point  where  the  undeveloped,  uncoordi- 
nated rhythmic  fragments  of  the  latter  tend  to  break  into 
the  full  rhythmic  swing  of  verse.  In  verse,  as  in  music, 
syncopation  is  used  with  varying  freedom;  but,  undoubt- 
edly, as  Dr.  Patterson  says,  coincident  rhythm  prevails. 
By  a  sufficient  amount  of  twisting  and  by  a  complete  dis- 
regard of  sense  and  of  accepted  habits  of  speech  (although 
I  do  not  know  whether  I  should  be  considered  an  aggres- 
sive or  a  passive  timer  ^),  I,  too,  find  it  possible  to  fit  almost 

1  "The  Rhythm  of  Prose,"  p.  77. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  79. 

'  The  term  aggressively  rhythmic  timer  is  applied  to  those  who  "not 
only  attain  a  fair  degree  of  reproductive  precision  in  the  tests,  but 
evince  a  marked  pleasure  in  rhythmic  exercises  and  a  marked  tendency 
to  organize  upon  a  temporal  subjective  basis  all  of  their  conscious  life. 
Abundance  and  vividness  of  auditory  amd  motor  imagery;  unit  ac- 
curacy; sense  of  swing  and  ability  to  syncopate,  especially  in  complex 
tasks;  pleasure  in  the  effects  of  acceleration  and  syncopation;  pleasure 


THE  RHYTHM  OF  PROSE  207 

any  sentence  to  marching  or  to  any  given  tune;  but  I  do 
not  do  this  naturally.  In  fact,  it  goes  against  the  grain. 
This,  however,  is  of  no  great  consequence.  What  my 
conception  of  rhythm  leads  me  to  emphasize  is  this:  Verse 
utilizes  natural  habits  of  speech  to  establish  and  to  main- 
tain a  continuous  rhythmic  flow;  prose  has  no  such  in- 
tention; and,  when  by  accident  the  speaker  drifts  into  a 
rhythmically  coordinated  series  of  words,  consciousness  of 
what  he  is  doing  brings  surprise  to  both  speaker  and  hearer, 
and  normally  there  is  an  immediate  relapse  into  disjointed 
time-units.  Of  course,  this  is  not  true  of  highly  oratorical, 
dithyrambic  prose;  for  there  one  has  to  do  with  a  transi- 
tion product,  of  which  type  is  vers  libre,  though  for  the  most 
part  the  latter  is  more  of  an  interspersing  of  snatches  of 
verse  with  loose  combinations  of  prose  than  is  the  former, 
which  presents  on  occasion  a  gradual  working  of  prose 
into  a  more  and  more  regular  rhythmic  flow  until  it  be- 
comes a  swelling  and  receding  of  speech  impulses  in  no  wise 
to  be  differentiated  from  verse. 

Poetry  may  be  read  as  prose.  When  thus  read,  it  is 
prose,  because  the  rhythmic  effect  is  unsustained,  unco- 
ordinated. The  intention  being  to  produce  prose,  prose 
it  is  for  both  speaker  and  hearer.  But  prose  cannot  be 
read  as  poetry,  no  matter  what  Unear  arrangement  it  may 
receive  or  what  may  be  the  intention  on  the  part  of  the 

in  unitary  pulses  as  well  as  in  groupings  superimposed  upon  them;  and, 
finally,  strength  of  voluntary  and  involuntary  'subjective  rhythm,' 
seem  to  be  the  conditions  of  this  ability  to  organize,  upon  a  time  basis, 
any  haphazard  series."  —  Ibid.,  p.  94. 

"For  aggressively  rhythmic  states  of  mind  and  for  these  alone,  it  is 
true  that  'no  series  of  impressions  exists  that  cannot  in  some  way  be 
conceived  as  rhythmic ' ;  but  the  secret  can  be  made  clear  to  those  with 
aggressive  possibilities,  by  beating  and  humming  syncopating  rhythmic 
tunes,  in  which  there  is  added  to  the  haphazard  series  the  properly 
elastic  series  of  unitary  pulses."  —  Ibid.,  p.  95. 


208  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

reader.  A  few  phrases  may  set  up  a  rhythm  and  become 
so  highly  poetic,  that,  if  taken  out  of  the  whole,  they  would 
be  accepted  as  poetry;  but,  as  a  part  of  a  body  of  prose, 
the  rhythm  must  invariably  break  down  very  shortly,  and 
the  true  nature  of  the  form  he  revealed.  In  verse  of  a 
good  quality,  no  matter  whether  written  in  lines  or  not, 
there  is  in  the  syllables  the  potentiality  for  being  read  in 
rhythmic  patterns  which  are  felt  to  be  temporally  related. 
Al  that  writing  the  words  in  lines  can  do  is  to  indicate 
the  intention  of  the  author  as  to  what  attitude  should  be 
assumed  toward  his  product  and  to  make  clearer  in  some 
instances  the  length  of  the  phrases.  If  the  author  writes 
his  words  in  lines  of  set  lengths,  he  virtually  says  to  the 
reader : 

"This  is  poetry.  Seek  to  read  the  words  with  a  sustained 
tone  and  to  bring  out  the  centroids  and  the  pauses  as  I 
here  indicate  them;  otherwise  the  rhythmic  patterns  may 
not  be  apparent  to  the  listener  and  his  feeling  of  time-rela- 
tionship may  be  left  unaroused." 

Similarly,  by  drawing  vertical  lines  across  the  hori- 
zontal lines  of  written  music,  the  composer  says  to  the 
performer : 

"Put  your  stress  at  this  point,  or  my  rhythmic  pattern 
may  elude  you." 

Both  are  conventions  pure  and  simple.  They  do  not 
mean  that  any  division  into  units  occurs  at  these  places, 
or  that  the  continuity  of  flow  is  in  any  way  interrupted. 
They  are  just  academic  methods  of  Avriting  the  thing,  the 
better  to  aid  one  man  in  conveying  his  conception  and 
his  intention  to  another.  The  hearer  takes  no  note  of  bars 
or  feet  or  lines.  His  impressions  are  of  pauses  interspersed 
among  different  kinds  of  sounds  in  such  a  way  that  the 
sounds  become  grouped,  each  group  presenting  a  definite 
pattern  and  intensifying   the  feeling  of  general    time-rela- 


THE  RHYTHM  OF  PROSE  209 

tionship.  For  the  ear  there  is  no  possibihty  of  comparing 
the  first  group  with  the  final  group.  As  soon  as  the  first 
is  past,  it  can  not  be  brought  before  consciousness  again 
without  repeating  it,  so  that  what  remains  of  it  in  conscious- 
ness is  only  a  general  impression.  Therefore,  as  long  as 
a  feeling  of  general  equality  is  sustained,  all  that  is  neces- 
sary has  been  accomplished. 

"If,"  as  Dr.  Warner  Brown  says  of  verse,  "we  take  the  ground 
that  the  grouping  in  rhjrthm  is  an  effective  experience  and  if  we 
place  it  simply  in  the  dimension  of  strain  and  relaxation  it  becomes 
at  once  clear  why  no  regular  time  relations  are  necessary.  The 
regularity  becomes  a  matter  of  recurrence  of  strain  at  the  end  of 
a  definite  cycle.  The  muscles  may  take  a  longer  or  shorter  time 
to  accomplish  their  cycle  and  the  strain  may  not  come  at  equal 
intervals  of  time,  but  the  swing  is  there,  and  from  place  to  the  next 
place  is  one  definite  mental  state  held  together  by  the  continuous 
circular  process."  ^ 

This  swing,  held  together  by  the  continuous  circular  process, 
is  what  I  believe  to  be  at  times  almost  wholly  lacking  in 
ordinary  prose,  but  to  be  partially  developed  in  the  prose 
of  Walter  Pater  and  in  much  of  the  so-called  verse  of  Walt 
Whitman  ^  and  of  the  makers  of  vers  libre.  Of  course,  any 
one  constituted  as  is  the  aggressive  timer  may  be  able  to 
get  a  well-defined  rhythm  from  every  experience  of  life; 
but,  with  the  exception  of  those  rarely  gifted  beings,  I  am 
confident  that  the  subjective  scheme  which  Wundt  and 
Patterson  posit  as  lying  at  the  root  of  everything  is  in  no- 
wise as  binding  for  prose  as  for  verse.  If  it  is  found  in  prose 
at  all,  its  presence  is  very,  very  much  less  obvious  than  in 
verse;    and  it  is  never  consciously  sought  and  maintained 

1  "Time  in  EngUsh  Verse  Rhythm,"  p.  75. 

^  This  should  not  be  considered  as  derogatory  of  Whitman's  best 
lyrics,  some  of  which  I  consider  to  be  verse  of  a  very  high  order. 


210     THE   FOUNDATIONS   AND   NATURE   OF  VERSE 

as  a  structural  necessity.  The  occasional  introduction  of 
a  rhythmic  ^  passage  into  prose  does  give  it  dignity,  beauty, 
flow;  and  all  good  prose  does  manifest  a  tendency  toward 
rhythmic  coordination.  But  this  is  quite  different  from 
saying  that  prose  is  syncopated  verse. 

1  Saran,  in  spite  of  his  pronouncement  that  rhythm  is  purely  mental 
in  origin  ("Deutsche  Verslehre,"  p.  128),  holds  that  prose  is  seldom 
rhythynic,  but  predominantly  rhythmless  {Ibid.,  pp.  19-21). 

Shipper  ("History  of  Enghsh  Versification,"  Clarendon  Press, 
Oxford,  1910,  p.  3,  §  4)  says  that  the  rhythmic  order  of  prose  is  so 
loosely  constructed  as  not  to  obtrude  itseK  on  the  ear. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

SCANSION 

As  to  what  method  should  be  used  for  the  scanning  of 
verse,  I  say  without  hesitation:  —  The  same  that  is  used 
for  recording  the  rhythms  of  music.  Of  course,  there  is 
no  such  regularity  of  time-relations  in  verse  as  is  expressed 
by  these  symbols.  Neither  is  there  this  regularity  in  music 
itself.  In  both  music  and  verse,  however,  there  is  the  in- 
tention to  measure  off  time-intervals  of  equal  length  and 
of  similar  structure.  In  the  carrying  out  of  this  intention 
music  is  more  successful  than  verse,  because  music  is  less 
occupied  than  verse  with  the  expression  of  thought.  Cer- 
tainly our  present  methods  of  spelling  are  exceedingly 
defective;  but  we  have  been  able  to  devise  no  better  sym- 
bols for  this  purpose  than  those  offered  by  the  Roman 
alphabet.  The  same  is  true  of  musical  notation.  As  long 
as  it  enables  the  musician  to  express  his  musical  ideas  with 
a  fair  degree  of  accuracy,  he  makes  shift  to  get  along  with  it. 
In  applying  it  to  expressing  the  rhythm  of  verse,  there  is 
this  advantage,  —  The  rhythm  of  verse  can  then  be  clapped 
off,  and,  in  being  clapped,  is  recognizable  as  the  rhythm 
of  the  specimen  of  verse  under  examination.  This  process 
of  reproducing  the  rhythms  by  clapping  is  certainly  not 
possible  from  any  system  of  scansion  such  as  longs  and 
shorts  or  accents  and  non-accents.  It  has  the  further 
advantage  of  making  evident  the  continuity  of  verse  and 
of  showing  the  repetition  of  temporal  patterns  alike  in 
kind  as  well  as  of  approximately  equal  duration.     In  the 

211 


212     THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

scanning  of  songs  from  listening  to  their  being  sung,  pitch 
relations  are  ignored;  and  only  the  temporal  relationships 
of  the  tones  are  set  down..  These  temporal  relationships 
are  not  written,  however,  exactly  as  they  are  heard  (for 
the  imperfectness  of  musical  notation  makes  this  impos- 
sible) ,  but  as  nearly  approaching  this  as  the  assumption  of 
theoretic  temporal  equality  among  the  time-intervals  will 
permit  of. 

That  "all  art  is  a  compromise"  must  be  taken  into  con- 
sideration by  every  true  theory  of  art;  and  no  theory  of 
poetics  which  does  not  recognize  this  without  wincing  and 
without  attempting  to  evade  the  issue  can  hope  for  so  much 
as  an  approximation  to  truth.  Admitting  that  there  is  no 
absolute  equality  of  time-length  to  be  found  anywhere  in 
either  verse  or  music,  I  can  still  make  equality  of  time- 
length  one  of  my  major  premises  with  just  the  same  degree 
of  assurance  as  the  painter  posits  the  possibility  of  draw- 
ing a  straight  line.  Just  as  the  eye  will  accept  as  straight 
Unes  which  only  a  casual  inspection  will  convince  any  one 
are  not  straight,  so,  too,  the  ear  will  be  satisfied  with  a 
surprising  degree  of  departure  from  absolute  exactness, 
provided  the  inequality  be  not  introduced  too  abruptly 
or  thrust  too  rudely  upon  the  attention. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 
SUMMARY 

Prose,  verse  and  music,  as  tonal  arts,  are  constructed 
of  the  same  material,  —  namely,  sounds  and  silences. 
Silence  has  but  one  dimension;  and  this  is  length.  Sounds 
are  characterized  in  four  ways,  —  that  is,  by  differences  in 
pitch,  intensity,  tone-color,  and  duration.  Each  of  the 
arts  will  use  this  material  in  accordance  with  the  object 
which  it  has  in  view.  The  primarj'^  intention  of  prose  is 
to  convey  thought.  Both  verse  and  music  have  in  view 
the  awakening  of  emotion.  Verse  strives  to  awaken  this 
emotion  through  the  intellect  and  through  the  senses. 
Music  makes  its  appeal  to  the  senses.  Neither  music  nor 
verse  nor  prose  stands  apart  in  any  such  clear-cut  differ- 
ence of  intention  as  I  have  stated  here.  One  grades  into 
the  other.  Since  there  come  moments  when  the  intention 
of  prose  is  almost  identical  with  the  intention  of  certain 
types  of  verse  and  when  the  intention  of  verse  overlaps 
the  intention  of  music,  at  such  times  the  mode  of  expres- 
sion of  the  one  art  form  is  compelled  to  overlap  the  mode 
of  expression  of  the  other. 

Prose  and  verse  and  music  present  a  tonal  structure  and 
a  rhythmic  structure.  To  dissimilarity  in  these  two  par- 
ticulars are  attributable  the  formal  differentiation  of  the 
one  from  the  other.  Upon  identity  in  these  rest  the  in- 
trinsic qualities  which  cause  them  to  be  classified  in  common 
as  tonal  art. 

Tonally,  prose  and  verse  are  differentiated  from  music, 
in  that  music  employs  only  those  pitches  which  are  capable 

213 


214     THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

of  coordination  into  scales  of  one  kind  or  another.  The 
pitches  of  verse  are  more  definite  than  those  of  prose;  but 
even  in  verse  the  pitches  are  still  utterly  incapable  of  stand- 
ardization, so  that  no  person  or  no  two  persons  speak  the 
same  passage  twice  in  exactlj''  the  same  way  as  regards 
either  absolute  pitch  or  as  regards  inflection.  The  various 
forms  of  rhyme  are  mere  tonal  embellishments,  presenting 
no  means  whatsoever  of  differentiating  prose  from  verse 
or  either  of  these  from  music. 

Rhythm  is  constituted  by  the  consecutive  occurrence 
of  phenomena  which  are  perceived  as  forming  a  succession 
of  distinct,  related  patterns  in  time. 

Prose,  verse,  and  music  have  rhythm  in  common.  Prose 
rhythm  is  undeveloped,  fragmentary.  Before  it  can  be 
sufficiently  well  established  to  awaken  a  feeling  of  relation- 
ship as  to  the  successive  patterns,  any  given  pattern  breaks 
down:  and  the  impression  of  continuity  is  at  once  de- 
stroyed. The  rhythmic  patterns  of  verse  and  of  music, 
on  the  other  hand,  are  presented  to  consciousness  as  re- 
lated units  in  an  unbroken  temporal  whole.  Every  sound 
and  every  silence  is  related  to  every  other  sound  and  every 
other  silence  by  virtue  of  its  being  of  such  a  length  that  it 
is  felt  to  have  a  place  in  a  measured  temporal  scheme.  In 
music  the  sounds  and  the  silences  are  really  of  much  more 
definitely  fixed  lengths  than  in  verse.  Were  it  not  for  the 
fact  that  in  the  latter  certain  successions  of  syllables  of  the 
same  general  kind  occur  with  sufficient  frequency  to  create 
the  impression  of  temporalness  among  them,  the  rhythm 
could  not  be  carried  forward  with  enough  certainty  to 
produce  an  impression  of  continuity  and  completeness. 

Vowels  are  neither  long  nor  short,  high  nor  low.  They 
are  tone-colors  of  indefinite  length.  When  combined  with 
consonants  to  form  syllables  and  words,  the  vowels  then 
assume  such  time-lengths  as  the  speaker   wishes  to   give 


SUMMARY  215 

them.  Vowels  and  syllables  which  habit  of  speech  causes 
to  be  stressed  usually  receive  greater  time-value  than  un- 
stressed vowels  and  syllables,  though  this  is  not  invariably 
the  case.  The  vowel  sounds  of  different  lengths,  when 
interwoven  with  silences  and  when  considered  apart  from 
the  other  characteristics  of  verse,  are  not  sufficiently 
regular  of  themselves  to  estabhsh  a  feehng  of  temporal 
relationship  from  which  it  would  be  possible  to  build  up  a 
rhythmic  whole. 

Centroid  syllables  (of  which  the  rhyming  syllable  is  a 
special  class)  and  pauses  are  the  phenomena  which  mark 
for  the  senses  the  time-divisions  of  verse.  Neither  between 
pauses  nor  between  centroid  syllables  is  there  true  equality 
of  time-length.  Nevertheless,  they  furnish  types  of  re- 
currence of  sufficient  regularity  to  be  accepted  as  periodic 
under  the  special  conditions  presented  by  verse.  Rhyme, 
as  a  centroid  syllable,  furnishes  a  periodic  tone-color  at  a 
moment  when  its  appearance  reenforces  the  rhythmic 
accent.  In  addition,  it  has  the  same  function  as  that 
performed  by  the  pause;  namely,  —  It  aids  in  grouping 
together  the  words  that  logically  and  rhythmically  belong 
together. 

Within  the  time-divisions  marked  off  by  the  centroid 
syllables  occur  different  kinds  of  syllables  which  come  to 
be  felt  as  temporally  related  because  syllables  of  like  kind 
are  repeated  in  sufficiently  definite  successions  to  establish 
in  the  perceiver  a  feeling  of  progressive  unity  and  com- 
pleteness when  divided  by  the  pauses  into  groups  of  fairly 
definite  length  called  phrases.  Because  the  phrases  are 
all  fundamentally  similar  in  structure  and  are  built  on  the 
same  temporal  uniformity  of  recurring  centroid  syllables, 
they  fit  into  the  general  swing  of  the  poem  and  are  felt  to 
coalesce  into  complete  unit}'^  of  movement  as  regards  the 
whole. 


216  THE  FOUNDATIONS  AND  NATURE  OF  VERSE 

The  arrangement  of  verse  into  lines  of  fixed  length  is  a 
purely  arbitrary  matter,  having  nothing  to  do  with  its 
structure,  except  in  so  far  as  the  arrangement  into  lines 
sometimes  aids  in  making  the  phrasing  of  the  poem  the 
more  readily  apparent  to  the  eye  of  the  reader.  The  dif- 
ferentiation of  prose  from  verse  lies  deeper  than  a  mere 
convention  of  writing.  The  difference  in  the  two  forms  is 
fundamental,  regardless  of  the  manner  in  which  the  words 
are  written.  Seeking  to  attain  different  effects,  they  em- 
ploy different  means  to  that  end.  Prose  avoids  regularity; 
verse  relies  upon  it.  Verse  demands  an  uninterrupted  flow 
of  rhythm;  prose  never  allows  the  impression  of  rhythm 
to  become  more  than  momentary. 

There  is  no  organic  difference,  however,  between  the 
various  so-called  feet  of  verse.  They  represent  merely 
the  perceiver's  method  of  grouping  the  syllables.  If  he 
feels  the  syllable  to  be  grouped  with  the  preceding  centroid 
syllable,  he  will  look  upon  the  succession  as  a  trochaic  or 
an  anapaestic  movement.  If  he  feels  the  syllable  or  sylla- 
bles to  be  grouped  with  the  succeeding  centroid  syllable, 
the  succession  will  be  for  him  iambic  or  dactylic.  If  the 
pauses  come  in  such  a  way  that  he  feels  the  syllables  to 
belong  one  before  the  centroid  and  another  after  it,  he 
conceives  of  it  as  an  amphibracic  movement.  Any  number 
of  syllables  or  any  order  of  arrangement  that  does  not 
interfere  with  the  regular  onward  swing  can  be  introduced 
into  a  movement.  As  to  what  patterns  can  be  thus  intro- 
duced into  any  particular  movement,  it  is  impossible  to 
formulate  a  single  rule.  Everything  will  depend  upon  the 
special  conditions  under  which  the  individual  syllable  or 
syllables  are  introduced.  All  that  scansion  can  do  is  to 
record  the  rhythmic  patterns  of  verse,  and  thus  aid  in  at- 
taining an  understanding  of  its  structure.  To  undertake 
to  deduce  from  these  patterns  the  laws  of  rhythmic  sue- 


SUMMARY  217 

cession  is  to  chase  the  wind.  The  patterns  of  verse  are 
almost  as  free  as  the  rhythmic  patterns  of  song;  and  surely 
no  one  would  attempt  to  dictate  in  what  order  the  tone- 
lengths  of  song  should  follow  one  another. 

The  rhythm  of  verse  is  identical  with  the  rhythm  of 
such  music  as  results  from  unaccompanied  singing  by  a 
single  voice.  As  soon  as  an  accompaniment  is  introduced 
or  several  voices  sing  at  once,  the  time-units  of  music  are 
compelled  to  take  on  greater  regularit}''  in  order  that  the 
various  parts  may  hold  together.  In  music  a  perfectly 
indefinite  number  of  rhythms  may  be  carried  on  simul- 
taneously, provided  they  can  be  fitted  into  the  same  tem- 
poral divisions,  and  provided  thej'^  follow  the  same  tonal 
structure.  The  presence  of  a  very  strong  accent  makes  it 
possible  to  carry  forward  simultaneously  many  rhythms 
which  without  it  would  most  assured^  fall  apart.  The 
rhythms  of  verse  must  always  be  comparatively  simple, 
because  the  centroids  can  never  be  given  undue  promi- 
nence or  be  made  to  occur  with  too  great  regularity  without 
producing  singsong,  while,  if  some  very  clearly  marked 
phenomenon  such  as  an  unusually  pronounced  centroid  be 
lacking  and  the  rhythm  become  in  the  least  complicated, 
the  ear  fails  to  make  the  necessary  correlation,  the  various 
units  cease  to  be  felt  as  belonging  together;  and  the  whole 
falls  apart. 

As  far,  then,  as  structure  is  concerned,  verso  is  that 
form  of  tonal  art  which  makes  use  of  syllables  of  different 
intensity,  length,  and  tone-color,  and  of  indefinite  and 
varying  pitches,  when  combined  with  periods  of  silence,  tO' 
establish  rhythmic  patterns  which  are  felt  to  maintain  to- 
one  another  temporal  relations  such  that  each  successive- 
pattern  takes  its  place  in  a  general  time  scheme,  sensibly- 
uniform  throughout,  and  contributes  toward  an  impression 
of  unity  and  completeness  as  regards  the  whole. 


APPENDIX 

The    followings    books    contain   excellent   bibliographies 
in  their  respective  subjects: 

I.  Acoustics: 

Helmholtz,  Hermann  von:  "Sensations  of  Tone,"  trans- 
lation by  A.  J.  Ellis  (London,  1885). 

Miller,  Dayton  Clarence:  "The  Science  of  Musical 
Sounds"  (Macmillan,  New  York,  1916). 

Rayleigh,  Lord:  "Theory  of  Sound,"  2  vols.  (London, 
1894). 

Winkelmann:  "Handbuch  der  Physik"  (Leipzig,  1909). 
Vol.  IL  is  by  F.  Auerbach,  and  is  called  "Akustik." 
This  volume  contains  the  bibhography. 

Zahm,  J.  A.:  "Sound  and  Music"  (Chicago,  1892).  Out 
of  print  at  present. 

II.  Anthropology: 

Wallaschek,  Richard:  "Primitive  Music"  (Longmans, 
London,  1893). 

III.  Prosody: 

Alden,  Raymond  Macdonald:  "An  Introduction  to 
Poetry"  (Henry  Holt,  New  York,  1909). 

Cowl,  R.  P.:  "Theory  of  Poetry  in  England"  (Macmillan, 
New  York  and  London,  1914). 

Gayley  and  Scott:  "Methods  and  Materials  of  Literary 
Criticism"  (Ginn  and  Co.,  Boston,  1901). 

Omond,  T.  S.:    "EngUsh  Metrists  (18th  and  19th  Centu- 
ries)" (Oxford  University  Press,  London,  1907). 
219 


220  APPENDIX 

IV.  Rhythm: 

Patterson,  Wm.  Morrison:  "The  Rhythm  of  Prose" 
(Columbia  University  Press,  New  York,  1916). 

Ruckmich,  Christian  A.:  "The  Role  of  Kinsesthesis  in  the 
Perception  of  Rh3rthm,"  American  Journal  of  Psychol- 
ogy, XXIV.,  No.  4,  1913,  pp.  508-519. 

Weld,  Harry  Porter:  "An  Experimental  Study  of 
Musical  Enjoyment,"  American  Journal  of  Psychology, 
XXIIL,  April,  1912,  pp.  300-308.  This  is  an  excellent, 
classified  bibhography. 


INDEX 


Aalst,  T.  A.  van,  36 
Accent,  63,  64,  100,  108,  110,  120, 
122-129,  133-135,  137-139, 
142,  143,  158,  162,  170, 
180,  185,  186,  188,  195, 
203-206,  211,  217 

deferred,  139,  140 

hovering,  139,  140 

logical,  140,  141 

metrical,  141 

word,  140,  141 

wrenched,  141 
"Accuracy   of   Voluntary    Move- 
ment," 105 
Acoustics,  219 

"Aesthetische  Einfiihlung, "  84 
"Afferent    Values    in    Articulate 

Sounds,"  56 
"Afro-American  Folk  Song,"  4,  26 
Agnew,  P.  G.,  40 
"Akustik,"  40,  62,  219 
Alden,  R.  M.,  219 
Alliteration,  53,  59,  160-165,  188 
Ambrose,  W.  A.,  3 
Amphibrach,  173,  214,  216 
Amplitude,  61 
"Analysis     of     Complex     Sound 

Waves,"  39 
Anapaest,  123,  177,  197 
"Ancient  Egyptians,"  35 
Andrian,  F.  von,  3,  67 
Anglo-Saxon,  165,  188 
Angell,  75 

"Animal  Sketches,"  65 
"Annabel  Lee,"  166 


Anthropology,  219 
"Application  de  la  m^thode  gra- 
phique    k  l'6tude    de    I'in- 
tensite  de  la  voix,"  62 
"Art  of  Music,"  23 
Art,  213 

capabilities  of,  184 

expressed  in,  74 

origin  of,  65 

temporal,  124 

tonal,  191,  212,  213,  217 
Assonance,  53,  59,  160-162 
"Atmungs-  und  Pulssymt.  rhyth- 

mischer  Gefuhle,"  71 
"  A  travers  chants,"  36 
Auerbach,  F.,  40,  47,  219 

Bach,  Johann  S.,  25 

Bacon,  Francis,  134,  142 

Baker,  Theodor,  4,  24,  26,  35 

Ballads,  4 

Balz,  Albert,  57 

Bar,  168 

Barton,  40 

Beats,  21,  40,  135 

Beat-tone,  22,  39,  40,  41 

Beethoven,     Ludwig     von,     157, 

206 
"Beginnings  of  Poetry,"  4 
"Beitrage  zur  Analyse  der  Emp- 

findungen,"  80,  84 
"Beitrage  zur  deutschen  Metrik," 

129,  176 
"Beitrage     zur     experimentellen 

Psychologie,"  80 


221 


222 


INDEX 


"Beitrage  zur  Theorie  der  sinn- 

lichen      Aufmerksamkeit," 

72 
"Bells,  The,"  55,  113 
Belugnon,  L.,  74 
Benussi,  V.,  71,  104,  178 
Bergson,  Henri,  81 
Berlioz,  Hector,  36 
Bevier,  Louis,  47 
Billert,  4,  36 
Binet,  75 
Bingham,     W.    Van    Dyke,     18, 

29-34 
Bolton,  T.,  72,  75,  104,  174,  176 
"Boundaries      of       Music      and 

Poetry,"  3 
Bourdon,  P.,  62 
Breath,  135,  144 

group,  see  phrase 
Bridgman,  Laura,  74 
Brown,  M.  E.  and  A.  W.,  24 
Brown,  Warner,  101, 104, 107, 110, 

111,    113,    116,    117,    129, 

133,    142,    152,    179,    195, 

209 
Browning,  Robert,  135,  143,  162 
Brucke,  75,  114,  128 
Burton,  R.  F.,  36 

Centroid,  125-130,  132,  135-137, 
139,  140,  143,  146,  173, 
176,  179,  180,  185,  191-197, 
200,  207,  215,  216 

Chanting,  4 

Characteristic,  50 

Child,  F.  J.,  4 

"Childe  Harold,"  142 

"Chinese  Music,"  36 

"Chinese  Theory  of  Music,"  36 

Chopin,  F.,  91,  135,  157 

"Christabel,"  142 


Clark,  Albert  C,  201 

Cleghorn,  A.,  129 

Coincidence,  205,  206 

Coleridge,  S.  T.,  142,  143,  195 

Consciousness,  80 

Consonance,  33,  53 

Consonant,  48,  116,  160,  214 

"Construction  and  Type  of 
Shakespeare's  Verse  as  seen 
in  'Othello,'"  158 

"Contributions  to  a  Psychologi- 
cal Theory  of  Music,"  21 

"Contribution  to  the  Psychology 
of  Time,"  82,  123 

Corry,  Joseph,  66 

Courtier,  75 

"Creative  Evolution,"  81 

Dactyl,  158,  173,  177,  197,  216 

Dance,  65-67,  74,  76 

Darwin,  Charles,  23,  26,  65 

Dearborn,  W.  F.,  1 

"Descent  of  Man,"  23,  26,  65 

"Deutsche   Verslehre,"    124,    210 

Dickens,  Charles,  204 

Dietz,  72 

Diphthong,  47 

Dogiel,  75 

Donders,  44 

Donovan,  J.,  5 

Drozinski,  L.,  71 

Duration,  10,  64,  80,  81,  90,  103, 
104-107,  110,  125,  140, 
168-170,  172,  175,  176, 
213 

Ebhardt,  75 
Edwards,  P.  H.,  39 
Eijkman,  L.  P.  H.,  10 
"Elements    of    a    Psychological 
Theory  of  Melody,"  129 


INDEX  223 

"Elements  of  Experimental  Pho-  Frequency,  see  Pitch 

netics,"  48  "From  Lyre  to  Muse,"  5 

Ellis,  A.  J.,  53  Fundamental,  16,  39,  46 
"Embassy  at  Ava,"  36 

Emotion,    sympathetic   induction  Gardner,  W.,  3 

of,  5  Gayley,  C.  M.,  138,  165,  219 

"English    and    Scottish    Popular  Generator,  41 

Ballads,"  4  "Genetic  Aspects  of  Consonance 
"English    Metrists,"    125,    219  and  Dissonance,"  6,   23 

"EngUsh   Poetry:    Its   Principles  "Genetic  Study  of  Rhythm,"  164 

and  Progress,"  138,  165  Genvig,  G.  W.,  190 

Equivalence,  178  Gilman,  B.  I.,  31 

"Essai    sur   les    principes    de    la  Gilver,  Robert  C,  54-56,  59,  173 

metrique  anglaise,"  29,  53,  Glottal  catch,  10 

56,  67,  73, 116-118, 130, 133  "Good-bye  Sweet  Day,"  135 

"Essay  on  Death,"  142  Grassmann,  H.,  44 

Ettlinger,  75,  104,  126  Grosse,  Ernst,  84 

"Experimental  Psychology,"  72  "Grundlegung  der  Aesthetik,"  29 

"Experimental  Study  of  Musical  "Grundziige  der  Phone tik,"  72 

Enjoyment,"  3,  5,  57,  71,  Guessfelt,  4,  65 

146,  220  Guest,  Edwin,  63,  100,  133 

"Experimental  Studies  of  Rhythm  Gummere,  F.  B.,  4 

and  Time,"   105,  127,  157,  Gurney,  E.,  72 

173,  174,  179 

"  Experiments  on  the  Time  Re-  Hall,  104 

lations  of  Poetical  Meters,"  "  Handbuch  der  Physik,"  40,  219 

82,  115  Harmonic,  see  Partial 

Harmony,  35,  59,  175 

Faber,  Ernst,  36  Hauptmann,  75 

Falkenstein,  4,  65  Haushegger,  75 

Fifth,  14,  17,  18,  22,  32  Helmholtz,  Hermann  von,  23,  39, 
Fiske,  John,  70  40,  44-47,  49,  219 

"  Fluctuation  of  Attention,"  88,  97  Hemistich,  165 

Folk-song,  4  Hermann,  45 

Foot,  135,  136,  138,  140,  158,  189,  Hewlett,  C.  W.,  39 

216  Hexachord,  14 

compensating,  137,  165  Heyse,  56 

Formant,  45  "History  of    EngUsh   Prosody," 
Foster,  Henry,  66  178 

Fourth,  14,  18  "History    of    English    Versifica- 
Frequency,  8  tion,"  210 


224 


INDEX 


"History  of  Prose  Rhythm,"  201      Koenig,  Rudolph,  13,  40 


Krehbiel,  H.  E.,  4,  26 
Kulpe,  82 

Ladd,  97 

"Lake  Regions  of  Central  Africa," 

36 
Land,  J.  P.  N.,  18 
Lander,  Richard,  66 
Landry,  E.,  124 
Lange,  72 

Language,  3,  4,  26-28 
Lanier,  Sidney,  31,  114,  117 
"Latest  Travels  of  I.  P.,"  36 
Law  of  the  Return,  32,  59, 169 
Intensity,  10,  50,  56,  Chap.  X,  61-      "  Laws  of  Tone-color  in  the  Eng« 
64,  78,  105,   124-129,  134,  Hsh  Language,"  55,  56 

140,  170,  172,  175,  176,  179,      "League  of  the  Ho-d6-no-san-nee, 
213,  217  or  Iroquois,"  24,  26 

Intoning,  3  "Leitfaden  der  Akustik,"  44 

"Introduction  to  Poetry,"  219  Length,  see  Duration 

"Introduction   to   the   Rhythmic      "Lieder  der  BaUakula  Indianer," 


"History  of  Smnatra,"  36 
Holmes,  75 
"Hopi  Songs,"  31 
Hofbauer,  129 
Hughlings-Jackson,  75 
Huhn,  Bruno,  156 
Hurst,  75,  80,  114,  115 
Hylan,  J.  P.,  88,  97 

Iamb,  168,  169,  173,  175-177,  197, 

204,  216 
"Impromptu,"  135 
Ingersoll,  R.,  204 
Instrument,  12,  17 


and  Metric  of  the  Classical 
Languages,"  72 
'  Isochronisme  dans  le  vers  fran- 
5ais,"  177 


35 

"Limits  of  Verse  Length,  The," 

188 
Lindig,  40 
Line,  142,  165-167,  188,  195,  206, 

208,  216 
Lipps,  Theodor,  29,  30,  84 
Lipsky,  Abram,  201 
Livingston,  David,  35 


Jacobsthal,  4 
James,  William,  81,  84 
"Japanische  Musik,"  4,  36 
Jastrow,  104 

Johnson,    Chas.    W.    L.,    14,    15,      Lloyd,  M.  G.,  40,  43,  46,  48 
174  "Loango  Expedition,"  4,  65 

Johnson,  72,  105  Loudness,  see  Intensity 

Jones,  D.,  10 

Josselyn,  48  "Maassbestimmungen    iiber    die 

Reinheit    consonanter    In- 
Kafka,  104  tervalle,"  21  1 

Keller,  Helen,  74  Macdougall,   Robert,   69,   75,   98, 

Key-note,  14  99,  103,  104,  123,  165 

Key-tone,  14  Mach,  Ernst,  75,  80,  84 


INDEX 


225 


"Manual  of  Psychology,"  81 

Marbe,  K.,  72,  201 

Mares,  116 

Marey,  111 

Marsden,  Wm.,  36 

Martius,  72,  105 

Mayor,  J.  B.,  vi,  vii 

McDougall,  Wm.,  5 

McKay,  75,  114,  115 

Measure,  165,  168 

"Measurement  of  Pitch  Discrimi- 
nation," 14 

Melodic  fragment,  30 

Melodic  trend,  32 

"Melodik  und  Rhythmik  Zueig- 
nung  Goethes,"  34 

Melody,  24,  29,  30-35,  59,   141, 
175,  204 
primitive,  31 

"Melody  of  Speaking,"  34 

Mentz,  75 

"M^thode  graphique,  La,"  111 

"Methods  and  Materials  of  Liter- 
ary Criticism,"  219 

Metre,  165 

Meumann,  Ernst,  72,  75,  82,  83, 
84,  104,  105,  123,  174,  176 

Meyer,  Max,  21,  29,  30,  31,  107, 
111,  128,  129,  176 

Miller,  D.  C,  8,  12,  15,  16,  22,  40, 
47,  50,  51,  61,  62,  219 

Miner,  J.  B.,  104,  125 

Minor,  J.,  75 

"Missionary  Travels  and  Re- 
searches in  Southern 
Africa,"  35 

Miyake,  114,  129 

Mode,  major  and  minor,  20,  36 

Modulation,  20 

Moodie,  John  W.  D.,  36 

Moore,  H.  T.,  6,  23 


Moore,  T.  V.,  105 
Morgan,  C.  L.,  65 
Morgan,  Lewis  H.,  24,  26 
Moritz,  R.  E.,  190 
"Most   Fundamental    Differentia 
of  Poetry  and  Prose,"  201 
"Motor,     Visual      and     Applied 

Rhythms,"  125 
Muller,  Max,  83 
Muller,  Robert,  129 
Munsterburg,  Hugo,  73,  80,  83 
Music,  6,  126,  127,  129,  133,  141, 
142,  146,  158,  160,  162,  163, 
167,    172,    175,    181,    184, 
186-188,     190,     191,     193, 
194,  198,  206,  208,  211-214, 
216 
Chinese,  14,  36 
development  of,  36 
distinguished  from  vocal  ut- 
terance, 65 
effects  attainable  by,  5 
Egyptian,  35 
Greek,  14,  35 

origin  of,  26-28,  67-69,  74 
Persian,  14 

time-lengths  in,  121;  see  Time- 
lengths  and  Time 
vocal,  4-6 
"Music  and  Emotion,"  57 
"Music  in  Relation  to  the  Intel- 
lect and  the  Emotions,"  69 
"Musical  Instruments  and  their 

Homes,"  24 
"Musical  Pitch  and  the  Measure- 
ment   of   Intervals  among 
the  Ancient  Greeks,"  14,  15 
"Musik   des   Griechischen   Alter- 

thumes.   Die,"  35 
"MusikaUsche  Bildung  der  Meis- 
tersanger,"  4 


226 


INDEX 


"  Musikalische  Gedachtnis  bei 
Katalepsie,  im  Traum,  in 
der  Hypnose,"  27 

"Narrative  of  a  Voyage  to  the 

South  Atlantic  Ocean,"  66 
"Native    Races    of    the    Pacific 

States  of  North  America," 

35 
Negro  sermonizing,  4 
"  New  Psychology,  The,"  72,  105, 

129 
Noise,  8-10 

Notation,  musical,  119,  211,  212 
Note,  length  of,  183,  194 
"Notes  on  EngUsh  Prosody,"  10 
Nichols,  E.  L.,  21 
Nichols,  84 

"Observations  upon  the  Wind- 
ward Coast  of  Africa,"  66 

Octave,  14,  15,  17 

Ohm,  G.  S.,  15 

Ohm's  Law  of  Acoustics,  15,  39 

Omond,  T.  S.,  125,  188,  219 

Onomatopseia,  53,  55-58 

"On  the  Inheritance  of  Rhythm," 
69 

"On  the  Decrease  of  Predication 
and  Sentence  Weight  in 
EngUsh  Prose,"  190 

"On  the  Difference  of  Time  and 
Rhythm  in  Music,"  86,  87 

"On  the  Origin  and  Function  of 
Music,"  26,  65 

"On  the  Time  Sense,"  72 

"On  the  Variation  and  Func- 
tional Relation  of  Certain 
Sentence  Constants  in 
Standard  Literature,"  190 

Oratory,  3 

Organ-pipe,  46 


"Outlines  of  Cosmic  Philosophy,' 

70 
"Outlines  of  Psychology,"  72,  80, 

82,  123 
Overtone,  »see  Partial 
"Overture  to  Tannhauser,"  89 

Pace,  72 

Parry,  Hubert  H.,  22 
Partial,  16-18,  39,  42,  46,  54,  60 
Pater,  Walter,  209 
Patterson,  Wm.  M.,  202,  206,  220 
Pause,    118,    121,    122,    132-134, 
137-146,  157,  158,  163-166, 

185,  187-189,  192,  193,  208, 
215 

Pechuel-Loesche,  4,  65 
Pentameter,  iambic,  165 
Periodicity,  70-72,  90-91,  96,  101, 
124,  137, 141,  146,  181,  185, 

186,  188,  191,  192,  200 
Pfeiffer,  Ida  Laura,  36 
Phase,  39,  40,  107 
"Philosophy  of  the  Human  Voice," 

34 
"  Photographische     Untersuchun- 

gen,"  45 
Phrase,    120,    121,    133,    144-146, 

149-159,  162,  163,  166,  181, 

187,  188,  190-194,  197,  198, 
200,  205,  207,  215,  216 

"  Physiologischen  Grundlagen  der 
neuhochdeutschen  Vers- 
kunst,  Die,"  115,  128 

"  Physiologische  Psychologie,"  80 

Pierce,  75 

Pipping,  45 

Pitch,  10,  12-14,  29,  35,  37,  41, 
56,  60,  61,  64,  78,  90,  106, 
123-126,  134,  171,  180,  187, 
204,  205,  213 


INDEX 


227 


Poe,  E.  A.,  55,  166 

Poetry,  see  Verse 
Poetry,  tonal  theory,  54 
"Power  of  Sound,"  72 
Present,  specious,  81 
Price,  Thomas  R.,  158,  159 
"Primer  of  Phonetics,"  107 
"Primer  of  Psychology,"  72 
"Primitive  Music,"  4,  23,  25,  59, 

67,  219 
"Principles  of  Psychology,"  81 
Proportion,  theory  of  simple,  110, 

119,  120 
Prose,  3,  4,  6.  67,  68,  74,  120,  126, 

127,    129,    130,    133,    134, 

141-143,  146,  158,  160,  161, 

165,  167,  176,  184,  188,  190, 

191,     193,     199-209,     213, 

214,  216,  217 
"Prose     Rhythm     in      Enghsh," 

201 
Prosody,    prosodic   problem,  v-ix 
Psychic  compound,  85 
"Psychologie  der  Zeitauffasung," 

71,  104,  178 
"  Psychologisches  Studien,"   29 
"Psychology:      Descriptive     and 

Explanatory,"  97 
"Psychology  of  Time,"  84 
"Psycho-physiological    Effect    of 

the  Elements  of  Speech  in 

Relation  to  Poetry,"  54-56, 

59,  173 
Punctuation,  167 
Pyrrhic  foot,  136,  138,  140 

Quality,  see  Tone-color  and  Vowel 

quality 
"Quantitative  Study  of  Rhythm," 

105,  114,  116,  129,  168,  170, 

171,  174,  176,  179 


Quantity,  110 

"Quelques  Experiences  d'Acousti- 
que,"  40 

Ratzel,  Friedrich,  36 

Rayleigh,  Lord,  47,  219 

Raymond,  George  L.,  74 

Reading,  psychological  process, 
1-3 

"Recherches  sur  I'histoire  de  la 
Gamme  Arabe,"  18 

Recitative,  4 

"Records  of  Captain  Clapperton's 
Last  Expedition  to  Africa," 
66 

Relationship,  22,  30,  32-34 

"Researches  in  Experimental  Pho- 
netics," 46,  48,  125,  128 

"Researches  in  Practice  and 
Habit,"  72,  105 

"Researches  on  Rhythmic  Ac- 
tion," 127 

"Researches  on  the  Rhythm  of 
Speech,"  72,  73,  99,  100, 
104,  105,  107,  110,  121,  126, 
127, 135, 177, 181 

Resolution,  34 

Resonance  chamber,  12,  41 

Resonator,  12,  41 

Return,  law  of  the,  32,  59,  161 

R^v^sz,  Geza,  23 

Rhyme,  59,  143,  160-167,  188, 
214,  215 

"Rhythm,"  71,  125,  176 

Rhythm,  24,  34,  35,  53,  59,  64, 
67-73,  75-77,  86-89,  90, 
92-101,  120,  123,  139,  157, 
169-173,  179,  180, 184-192, 
194,197-211,214-217,219 

"Rhythm  and  Harmony  in  Poetry 
and  Music,"  74 


228 


INDEX 


"Rhythm  and  Rhyme,"  114,  145,  "Science  of  Musical  Sounds,"  8, 
155,  157,  158,  162-164,  173,  12,  16,  22,  40,  47,  49-51,  61, 

176,  186,  188,  194,  196-198  219 

"Rhythm    as    a    Distinguishing  Scott,  F.  N.,  10,  201 

Characteristic      of      Prose  Scott  and  Gayley,  219 

Style,"  201  Scott,  John  R.,  34 

Rhythmic  sense,  73  Scripture,  E.  W.,  45-48,  72,  75, 

"Rhythmische-melodische       Stu-  105,    125,    126,    128,    129, 

dien,"  203  155,  158,  186 

"Rhythm    of    Prose,"    202,    203,  Sears,  172 

206,  220  Seashore,  C.  E.,  14 

Ribot,  75  Second,  18,  23 

Roblee,  Louise,  56  "Sensations  of  Tone,"  23,  39,   44, 

"R61e    of    Kinsesthetics     in    the  219 

Perception  of  Rhythm,"  3,  Seventh,  18,  23 

88,  220  Shakespeare,  Wm.,  166 

"Role  of  Pitch  in  Rhythm,"  126,  Shaw  and  Wrinch,  75,  82-85,  123, 


164,  171 
Rousselot,  111 
Ruckmich,  C.  A.,  3,  88,  220 
Rush,  Dr.,  34 
Ruskin,  John,  204 

Saintsbury,  George,  117,  138,  178, 

201 
Saran,  F.,  34,  124,  210 
Sargent,  55 
Scale,  214 

diatonic,  19,  22 

origin  of,  24-26 

pure,  15 

tempered,  15,  19 
Scansion,  138,  198,  204,  210-212, 

216 
"Scansion  of  Prose  Rhythm,"  201 
Schmidt,  72 
Schubert,  Franz,  155 
Schumann,  F.,  82,  105 
"Schwankungen     der     Gesichts- 

empfindvingen.  Die,"  72 
"Science  of  English  Verse,"  31 


172,  174 
Sherman,  L.  A.,  190 
Sherrington,  75 
Shipper,  210 
Sievers,  72,  75,  203 
Silence,    103-105,    108,   120,    121, 

183,  184,  186,  191,  213-215, 

217 
Sixth,  18 

Smith,  72,  75,  83,  105 
"Social  Psychology,"  5 
"Some    Observations    upon    the 

Sentence-length  in  EngUsh 

Prose,"  190 
"Some  Results  of  Modern  Eth- 
nology," 3,  67 
Song, 

bird,  24 
origin  of,  26 
Sonnet,  190 
Sound,  77,  103,  104,  106-108,  183, 

186,  191,  213,  214 
aesthetic  value  of,  5 
medium  of  communication,  3 


INDEX 


229 


musical,  8 
of  subdivision,  15 
physiological  effect  of,  5 
psychological  effect  of,  5,  6 

"Sound  and  Music,"  22,  41,  219 

Speech, 

development  of,  27,  28,  36 
sounds,  107 

"Speech  in  Song,"  53 

"Speech  Sounds:  Their  Nature 
and  Causation,"  49 

Spencer,  Herbert,  26,  65 

"Spencerian  stanza,  190 

"Spencer's  Lehre  von  dem  Uner- 
kennbaren,"  84 

Spondee,  135,  136,  140 

Squire,  103,  164,  171 

Stainer,  Sir  John,  69 

Stanza,  142,  189,  190 

Stave,  158 

Stetson,  R.  H.,  114,  128,  145,  155, 
157,  158,  162-164,  173,  175, 
176,  186,  188,  196-198 

Stevens,  72,  174 

Storm,  47 

Stout,  G.  F.,  81 

Street  cries,  3 

Stress,  see  Accent 

suspended  or  deferred,  138 

"Structure  of  Simple  Rhythm 
Forms,"  69,  98,  99,  105 

"Studies  from  Yale  Psychological 
Laboratory,"  114 

"Studies in  Melody,"  18,  29, 30-34 

"Studies  in  Rhythm,"  104 

"Study  in  Reaction  Time  and 
Movement,"  105 

"Study  of  Metre,  A,"  125 

Stumpf,  Carl,  21,  35,  75 

Substitution,  178 

Sweet,  47,  107 


Swindle,  P.  F.,  69 
Syllable, 

accent,  137 

in  phrase,  144,  200 

in  prose  and  verse,  184 

length,    110,    116,    118,    120, 
122,  126,  180,  186,  217 

nonsense,  196 

relation  of,  194-197,  200,  214 

strong,  116,  215,  216 

weak,  116 
Sjones,  Michael,  36 
Sympathetic    induction    of    emo- 
tion, 58,  60,  63,  69 
Syncopation,  203-207,  210 
Syncope,  203 

"System  der  Sprachwissenschaft," 
56 

"Technique     of     the     Speaking 

Voice,"  34 
Tempo,  34,  90, 91, 175 
Tension,  144 

"Ten  Years  in  South  Africa,"  36 
Tetrachord,  14 
"Text-book  of  Sound,"  40 
"Th^orie     du     rhythm  e      et     le 

rhythme    du    frangais    d6- 

clam^.  La,"  124 
"Theory  of  Poetry  in  England,'* 

219 
"Theory  of  Sound,"  47,  219 
Third,  17,  18,  31,  32 
Tichener,  72 
Time,  34,  75-78,  80,    82,  84-89, 

91-93,     95,     99-101,     106, 

178-180, 195,  204,  205,  207, 

215,  217 
"Time  in  English  Verse  Rhythm," 

105,  107,111,129,195,199, 

209 


230 


INDEX 


Time-interval,  86,  115,  123,  186, 
193,  194,  203 

Time-length,  117-119,  121,  124, 
128,  132-134,  158,  163,  181, 
185,  186,  191,  194,  212,  214, 
215 

Timer,  204-206,  209 

Time-sense,  83,  96-88 

Time,  unit  of,  82-84,  97 

Tolman,  55,  56 

Tonality,  32,  37 

Tone,  8-10,  15 

portamento,  13 
relation  of,  22 

Tone-color,  10,  34,  38,  41,  59, 
78,  105,  106,  122,  124,  126, 
160,  161,  191,  204-206,  213, 
214,  216,  217 

Tone-quality,  38,  52,  53,  64 

Tonic,  18,  22,  23,  32,  36 

Transcience,  immediate  experi- 
ence of,  80,  81 

"Travdni  hldsek  a  slabik  die 
objectivne  miry,"  116 

Triad,  major,  22 

Trochee,  158,  168-173,  175-177, 
197,  204 

Tune,  speech,  31,  204,  207 

"t)ber    das    Ansteigen  der  Ton- 

erregnung,"  104 
"tJber  die  Bedeutung  der  Aphasie 

fiir  den  musikalischen  Aus- 

druck,"  27 
"tJber    die     Musik    der     Nord- 

amerikanischen  Wilden,"  4, 

24,  26,  35 
"tber  d.  Rhythmus  d.   Prosa," 

201 
"Une  nouveUe  Laura  Bridgman," 

74 


Unit  of  Time,  82,  83,  91,  97 
"Unscientific  Methods  in  Musical 

Esthetics,"  29 
"Untersuchungen  liber  den  Um- 

fang  des  Bewusstseins,"  72 
"Untersuchungen     zur     Psycho- 

logie    und    Aesthetik    des 

Rhythmus,"  72,  176 

Vance,  T.  F.,  14 
Vannah,  Kate,  135 
"Variations  in  Pitch  Discrimina- 
tion," 176 
"Variations       temporeUes        du 

rhythm,  Les,"  118 
Verrier,  Paul,  29,  53,  56,  67,  73, 
100,  116,  117,  118,  130,  133 
Vers  libre,  202,  205-207,  209 
Verse,  3,  6,  120,  126,  127,  129,  130, 
133,    138,    141,    142,    143, 
146,  158,  160-162,  164,  165, 
167,  177,  178,  183,  185-191, 
193, 198-202,  204-216 
accent  theory,  63,  100,  117 
blank,  166 
classical  theory,  117 
defined,  217 

fixed-pitch  theory,  44,  46 
musical  theory,  117 
origin  of,  66-68,  74 
"Verse  and  Prose,"  201 
Vibration,  8 
Viderot,  174 
Victor,  L.,  10 
Vocal  cords,  12,  13 
"Volkerkunde,"  36 
Vowel,  161,  215 

accommodation  theory,  45 
characterized  by,  44,  46-49, 51 
defined,  52,  53 
fixed-pitch  theory,  44,  46 


INDEX 


231 


fixed-resonance  theory,  45,  47 

49,  50 
high,  59,  60,  214 
length,  42,  52-54,   107,   112, 

116,  124,  134,  215 
long,  54,  116,  214 
low,  59,  60,  214 
medium,  60 
pitch,  5,  59 
produced  how,  46 
quality  or  color,  42,  43,  59-61 
relative-pitch  theory,  46 
short,  54,  116,  214 
theories  of,  44,  117 
"Vowel    Alliteration   in    Modern 

Poetry,"  10 

Wagner,  R.,  58,  89 

Walker,  John,  34 

Wallaschek,  R.,  4,  23,  25-28,  59, 
67-69,  86-88,  219 

Wallin,  J.  E.  Wallace,  72,  73, 
99,  100,  104,  105,  107,  109, 
116,  117,  120,  121,  126,  127, 
133,  135-137,  146,  157, 
174,  175,  177,  179-181,  186 

Washburn,  M.  F.,  56 

Webster,  A.  G.,  62 

Weinmann,  Fritz,  29,  30 

"Weitere  Untersuchimgen  u.d. 
Wesen  der  Vocale,"  45 


Weld,   H.  P.,  3,  5,  57,  71,   146, 

220 
Westphal,  Rudolph,  35 
Wheatstone,  Sir  Charles,  44,  45 
Whitman,  Walt,  209 
Wilkinson,  Sir  John  G.,  35 
WiUis,  43-45 
Winkelman,  40,  62,  218 
Winter,  D.,  201 
Wrinch,  and  Shaw,  75,  82-85,  123, 

172,  174 
Woodrow,  H.,  105,  116,  126,  127, 

129,  164,  168, 171,  174-176, 

179 
Woodworth,  R.  S.,  101,  105 
Wundt,  Wilhelm,  75,  80,  82,  123, 

174,  203,  209 

Young,  138,  165 

Zahm,  22,  41,  219 

"Zur    Frage    der   Schwankungen 

der    Aufmerksamkeit,"    72 
"Zur   Grundlegung   der   Tonpsy- 

chologie,"  23 
"Zur  Klangfarbe  der  gesungenen 

Vocale,"  45 
"  Zur  Lehre  von  den  Vokalklangen" 

45 
"Zur  Struktur  der  Melodie,"  29 
"Zur  Theorie  der  Melodie,"  29 


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